University  of  California. 

FROM    THK    LIBRARY    OF 

DR.     FRANCIS     L  I  E  B  E  R , 
I'nifcs.-'or  t-f  History  and  Law  in  Columbia  College,  Now  York. 


TIIK  GIFT  OF 

MICHAEL     REESE 

Of  Stir i  Francisco. 
1BT3. 


CHARACTERS 


CRITICISMS. 


TV.    ALFRED    JONES,    A.   M 


En    Stoo    Volumes. 

VOL.     I. 


NEW  YORK : 
I.    Y.    VVESTERVELT,    371    BROADWAY. 

1857. 


CLEMENT  0.  MOORE,  LL.  D., 

MY  FATHER'S  FRIEND, 

WHOSE  REGARD  FOR  HIS  MEMORY 

HAS  PROMPTED  MANY  KINDNES3ES  To  HI3  SON, 

THESE  VOLUMES  ARE  INSCRIBED, 
WITH  S1MTIMINTS  OF  GRATITUDE  AND  RESPECT, 

BY 

THE    AUTHOR. 


r* 


v.  i 

N  A  JA. 


CONTENTS  OF  VOL.  1. 


PAGE. 

L — New-Old  Essays  of  AdJison  and  Steele 1 

II. — Tyrone  Power 12 

IIL — A  few  Homeric  Nods  in  Mr.  Hallam 15 

IV. — Religious  Novels 20 

V. — Literary  Ambassadors 28 

VL— The  Prose  Style  of  Poets 34 

VII— The  Morality  of  Poverty 42 

VIII. — Chapter  on  some  Old  and  Later  English  Sonnets 50 

IX. — Jeremy  Taylor,  the  Spenser  of  Divinity 68 

X. — Church  Music 74 

XL— Mr.  Braham 80 

XII.— The  Life  and  Adventures  of  Philip  Quarll 82 

XIII. — Walton's  Lives 95 

XIV.—  Elijah  Fentoa 100 

XV. — Swedenborgianisin 108 

XVL— Religious  Satire 118 

XVII. — Prose  of  Barrow 123 

XVIIL— The  Poems  of  Bishop  Corbet 127 

XIX.— The  Ladies'  Library 135 

XX.— The  Early  Maturity  of  Genius 143 

XXI. — Notoriety 153 

XXII.— Letters 1GO 

XXIII. — Pope  and  his  Friends 164 

XXIV. — Gray  and  Cowper 175 

XXV. — Amateur  Authors  and  Small  Critics 178 

XXVL— Female  Novelists 186 

XXVII. —Single-Speech  Poets 199 


VI.  CONTENTS. 

XXVIII. — On  Prefaces  and  Dedications 209 

XXIX.— Religious  Biography 220 

XXX.— Titles 230 

XXXI. — Minshull's  Essayes  and  Characteres  of  a  Prison  and 

Prisoners 242 

XXXIL— On  Preaching 248 

XXXIII  —Memoir  of  Dr.  J.  W.  Francis 266 

XXXIV— Wm.  S.  Mount 277 


INTRODUCTION. 


The  present  final  collection  of  his  miscellaneous  papers, 
originally  written  for,  and  printed  in  the  American  Monthly 
Magazine,  Arcturus,  the  Church  Record,  the  Democratic 
and  .  Whig  Reviews,  Boston  Miscellany,  Union  Magazine, 
Literary  World,  and  other  periodicals,  is  intended  to  in 
clude  such  of  the  writer's  papers  (chiefly  of  literary  criticism) 
as  have  appeared  to  him  worthy  of  preservation.  With  the 
exception  of  a  few  comparatively  recent  articles,  they  were 
mostly  written  and  printed  1838-1845,  and  comprise  a  little 
more  than  one-half  of  his  entire  contributions  to  the  press  up 
to  the  present  date. 

Most  of  the  papers  here  collected  (since  the  publication  of 
The  Analyst,  anonymously  in  1839,  and  which  was  made 
up  of  lucubrations  written  the  year  and  a  half  previously) 
have  appeared  already  in  the  volumes  of  Literary  Studies 
and  Essays  upon  Authors  and  Books.  Holding  the  doc 
trine  of  Hazlitt,  however,  to  be  sound,  that  a  first  edition  is 
as  good  as  MSS.,  as  the  impressions  of  all  these  three  mis 
cellanies  were  limited,  and  have  been  long  since  out  of  print, 
and  as  numerous  typographical  errors  had  crept  in,  as  well  as 
mistakes  of  fact  and  opinion,  it  was  thought  a  new  and  cor 
rect  edition  might  be  favorably  received  by  the  present  gen 
eration  of  readers,  young  students  in  particular,  in  college, 
the  lovers  of  the  choice  old  English  literature,  and  those 
cultivated  general  readers  to  whom  these  miscellanies  are 
unknown. 


Vlll.  INTRODUCTION. 

The  papers  selected  from  The  Analyst  embracing  nearly 
two-thirds  of  the  original  volume,  are  placed  in  the  appendix. 
In  point  of  time,  the  earliest  efforts  of  the  writer  and  most 
of  them  brief  after  the  classical  models  of  Essay  and  Charac 
ter-writing,  they  form  a  series  of  papers  distinct  from  his 
later  articles  of  a  similar  description. 

The  only  two  of  his  biographical  sketches,  which  appeared 
to  harmonize  with  the  literary  matter  of  which  these  volumes 
are  composed,  are  included  in  the  first  volume  and  a  few 
miscellaneous  lucubrations  heretofore  uncollected  in  the 
second. 

Dates  are  affixed  to  certain  of  the  essays  and  criticisms  to 
explain  allusions  and  suggestions  otherwise  unseasonable,  or 
to  exhibit  a  chronological  excuse  for  change  of  opinion.  The 
article  on  the  Opera,  if  now  written,  would  be  much  changed 
and  also  the  Thoughts  on  Bulwer  would  be  greatly  modified 
despite  the  generous  commendation  of  the  North  American 
Review,  April,  1840. 

Neio  York,  March  2,  1857. 


CHARACTERS  AND  CRITICISMS. 


i. 


NEW-OLD    ESSAYS    OF    ADDTSON    AND    STEELE. 

IT  is  not  an  infrequent  occurrence  in  the  case  of  volumin 
ous  writers,  that  a  proportional  moiety  of  their  productions 
become  after  a  short  period  succeeding  to  their  decease,  lit 
tle  known :  and  in  the  progress  of  a  century,  or  even  a  still 
briefer  space  of  time,  almost  obsolete.  After  the  enthusi 
asm  of  party  feeling,  or  the  excitement  of  novelty  has  gra 
dually  cooled  down  into  a  sober  appreciation  of  real  merit, 
from  a  previous  extravagant  estimate  of  it — wo  begin  to 
learn  the  true  secret  of  excellence,  to  discriminate  the  pe 
culiar  and  characteristic  traits  of  the  author  and  award  him 
the  palm  which  shall  continue  fresh  and  green  in  the  eyes 
of  posterity.  Of  many  copious  authors,  how  little  is  now 
generally  read — a  few  versitied  translations,  an  ode,  some 
satires,  and  a  prose  essay  or  two,  with  one  play  of  Dryden  ; 
only  two  or  three,  out  of  the  score  of  volumes  that  complete 
the  edition  of  Swift.  Of  Voltaire's  three  score,  a  few  satirical 
tales  and  historical  compends  :  some  two  or  three  dialogues 
of  Plato:  the  Essays  and  Advancement  of  Bacon:  the  Essay 
of  Locke :  a  play,  here  and  there,  of  the  Old  Dramatists :  an 
occasional  sonnet  of  a  writer  of  a  volume  of  sonnets.  These 
are  illustrations  at  hand :  a  very  long  list  might  be  made  of 


2  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

the  very  fertile  authors  who  have  been  popularly  known  as 
the  writers  of  but  one  work  of  pre-eminent  ability.  Bunyan, 
Defoe  and  Butler  are  striking  instances.  For  the  gratifica 
tion  of  personal  amusement,  or  the  curious  eye  of  the  diligent 
antiquary,  we  might  add  a  copious  appendix  of  this  sort,  but 
such  might  not  be  so  generally  acceptable,  as  these  occasional 
reflections  illustrated  by  fewer  examples. 

The  writers  of  the  present  century,  this  age  of  authors  and 
books,  will  in  all  probability  experience  a  very  great  diminu 
tion  in  the  extent  and  character  of  their  fame  with  the  coming 
age.  Countless  volumes  of  fiction  will  soon  be  laid  on  the 
shelf  for  ever ;  whilst  a  class  of  writers,  read  by  few  and 
whose  names  have  not  yet  gone  abroad  into  general  esteem, 
will,  we  venture  to  predict,  become  classical,  not  only  or  so 
much  from  the  capacity  of  their  genius,  as  from  its  direction 
to  the  permanently  classical  forms  of  writing.  Except  Scott  (a 
rast  deal  of  whose  writing,  it  has  been  confessed  by  more  than 
one  even  cautious  critic,  cannot  last)  what  novelist  will  gain 
in  fame,  as  the  Critic  and  Essayist  Hazlitt  ?  We  have  had, 
for  more  than  a  century,  no  humorist  like  Lamb ;  and  Hunt 
treads  closely  upon  the  heels  of  Steele.  Many  authors  too 
will  become  famous  in  spite  of  their  elaborate  attempts  at 
avoiding  fame:  the  squib,  the  pamphlet,  the  newspaper  edi 
torial,  will  throw  in  the  shade  heavy  Epics  and  dull  histories ; 
a  picturesque  sketch  of  manners,  a  fresh  and  spirited  portrait 
of  character,  true  and  genial  criticism,  speculations  on  life  and 
the  principles  and  motives  of  human  actions ;  these  form  the 
favorite  reading  of  the  best  class  of  readers  in  all  ages — and 
although  the  readers  of  Addison  and  Steele  may,  at  the  pre 
sent  day,  comprise  a  small  body,  still  they  have  admirers, 
and  there  are  also  readers  and  lovers  of  them  who  have  suc 
ceeded  them  in  the  same  form  of  composition.  What  style 


ADDISON    AND    STEELE.  3 

or  range  of  speculation  does  it  not  embrace?  It  is  too  di 
dactic  Tor  the  mass  of  readers,  who,  like  children  of  ignorant 
people,  must  be  entertained  at  the  same  time  they  are  taught : 
but  for  the  scholar  and  philosopher  it  is  invaluable. 

Myself  a  reader  and  writer  of  Essays,  I  must  confess  to  a 
special  fondness  for  the  very  name ;  and  I  have  contracted  a 
feeling  of  affectionate  interest  for  the  essayist  and  critic.  As 
I  run  my  eye  over  the  shelves  of  my  small  collection,  I  find 
few  books  it  rests  upon  with  such  pleasure  as  upon  the  es 
sayists,  moral  painters  and  historians  of  manners  and  fashions. 
There  are  Bacon  and  Temple,  and  Cowley,  with  the  admir 
able  writers  whose  names  are  placed  at  the  head  of  this  paper. 
There  too  are  Goldsmith  and  Shenstone  and  Mackenzie.  Nor 
may  I  omit  that  trio  of  masterly  essayists,  Lamb  and  Hazlitt 
and  Leigh  Hunt.  Of  the  French,  I  especially  cherish  Roche- 
foucald  and  Labruyere — writers  with  more  thinking  in  their 
maxims  and  sentences,  than  you  find  in  whole  pages  of 
weaker  writers.  Among  quite  recent  instances,  Carlyle  and 
Macaulay  in  England  ;  Guizot  and  Cousin  (though  more 
scholastic  than  strictly  belongs  to  general  essayists)  in  France: 
and  at  home,  Channing,  Emerson  and  Dewey.  Indeed,  the 
bes  twriting  of  the  present  day  is  to  be  found  in  periodical  lit 
erature  ;  though  we  have  lost  much  in  pure  classicality  and 
in  certain  traits  of  the  essay,  that  have  become  merged  in 
other  forms  of  writing.  Thus,  owing  to  the  necessity  of  ra 
pid  and  copious  productions,  inaccuracies  are  not  so  rare  as 
they  should  be  ;  and  evident  marks  of  haste  are  to  be  found. 
The  humorous  painting  of  the  Addisonian  school  has  become 
the  property  of  two  or  three  capital  novelists.  We  have  now- 
a-days  no  pictures  of  manners,  merely  in  essays  ;  and  since 
Hazlitt,  no  prose  satirist  of  decided  ability  has  arisen.  The 
Lecturers  and  Reviewers  occupy  a  large  portion  of  the  pro- 


4  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

vince  formerly  allotted  to  the  Essay.  Moral  speculation  and 
criticism ;  analysis  of  character,  historical  painting,  satirical 
description,  the  peculiar  characteristics  of  the  Essay,  have, 
for  the  most  part,  passed  into  other  forms.  Yet  a  taste  for 
this  kind  of  writing  is  retained  by  a  circle,  which  is  rapidly 
widening,  and  in  consequence  the  demand  has  evidently  in 
creased  for  more  of  literature,  of  the  pleasantest  kind — for 
something  brief,  pointed  and  pithy — with  somewhat  of  a  prac 
tical  bearing,  and  yet  which  is  to  be  considered  as  valuable  in 
a  purely  literary  estimate  of  the  matter. 

A  kind  of  Literature  is  needed  for  the  busy'  man  and  the 
gentleman,  as  well  as  for  the  recluse  scholar ;  a  tone  of  fresh 
vigor,  real  knowledge  of  life,  wide  and  original  experience  is 
requisite.  The  authors  of  this  must  be  men,  scholars,  and 
gentlemen.  It  is  not  by  any  means  the  most  ambitious  de 
partment  of  authorship,  but,  perhaps,  next  to  fine  poetry,  it  is 
the  most  stable ;  the  staple  is  life  and  books  :  feeling  and  pas 
sion  ;  without  inclining  to  system  or  method,  it  is  grave  and 
philosophical:  without  descending  to  farce  or  burlesque,  it 
admits  of  pleasantry  and  good-natured  ridicule.  It  is  not 
exact  or  mechanical  science,  but  the  science  of  human  nature 
and  the  art  of  criticism  (not  of  books  and  of  authors  only, 
but)  of  principles,  and  theories,  and  fashions,  and  contem 
porary  manners.  It  is  strictly  historical,  though  it  contains 
little  narrative,  for  it  points  out  the  sources  of  historical  truth. 
It  is  experimental  philosophy,  though  without  any  settled 
rules  of  art.  In  brief,  it  is  the  kind  of  writing  most  particu 
larly  addressed  to  all,  who,  while  they  read,  think  and  feel ; 
and  not  to  those  who  read  to  accumulate  and  display  know 
ledge. 

Addison  and  Steele  have  been  more  fortunate  than  most 
writers  of  essays,  not  only  as  they  are  among  the  best  but 


ADDISON    AND    STEELE.  5 

as  they  were  among  the  earliest.  Priority  is,  in  fact,  as  im 
portant  a  thing  in  Literature,  as  precedence  is  thought  to  be 
in  life.  The  tirst  writers  are  generally  the  best ;  at  all  events 
they  are  the  freshest  and  most  original.  In  point  of  delicate 
humor,  Addison  is  unsurpassed,  though  his  serious  writing, 
which  is  sometimes  almost  tame,  has  been  equalled.  Steele 
is  more  unique  :  such  naturalness,  so  easy  and  uniform  a 
style,  a  vein  of  sentiment  so  fresh  and  manly,  such 
charming  pleasantry,  such  elegance  of  compliment  and 
heartiness  at  the  same  time,  we  find  in  no  one  other  essayist. 
Not  a  few  periodical  writers  might  be  mentioned,  more  bril 
liant,  more  ingenious,  with  greater  learning  and  capacity, 
more  profound,  more  exact,  yet  none  who  are  so  delightful  as 
Steele  is  invariably.  Happy  on  any  topic,  he  is  perfectly  de 
licious  where  he  is  most  at  home,  and  writes  from  his  heart. 
The  greater  fame  of  Addison  has  arisen  in  part  from  higher 
pretensions  and  as  much  from  the  serious  nature  of  his  moral 
essays.  Addison,  too,  aimed  more  at  being  the  censor  ; 
Steele  was  content  with  the  reputation  of  sociality,  and  to  be 
loved  rather  than  be  admired.  Addison  was  perhaps  a  more 
cultivated  man,  but  Steele  had  wit  and  spirit,  that  needed 
slight  aids  from  scholarship — yet  he  would,  at  the  present 
day,  be  called  a  scholar.  Steele  had  less  art  and  policy  than 
his  associate,  was  more  open  and  credulous,  a  generous 
dupe,  though  deceived  by  no  lack  of  sense,  but  of  stratagem. 
Addison  was  author  all  over ;  Steele  was  more  of  the  man 
than  of  the  writer.  Both  were  admirable  in  their  respective 
manners.  Addison's  elegance  and  humor  gave  an  additional 
beauty  to  the  subjects  fullest  of  it,  naturally  ;  while  Steele's 
fine  sense  and  airy  style  played  with  easy  grace  upon  the 
most  barren  theme. 

Besides  the  Spectator,  Tattler  and  Guardian,  Addison  was 


6  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

concerned  in  other  periodical  publications.  He  was  not  only 
the  creator  of  Sir  Roger  de  Coverly,  the  satirist  of  the  beau 
monde,  the  elegant  sermonizer,  the  tasteful  critic;  but  also, 
the  warm  partizan  and  leading  political  writer.  "  The  Free 
holder"  was  a  strong  whig  paper,  edited  and  conducted  by 
Addison,  who  furnished  all  the  papers,  under  that  title,  which 
are  collected  into  a  single  volume.  It  consists  of  fifty-five 
essays,  and  was  commenced  in  the  year  '15,  celebrated  for 
the  first  rising  in  favor  of  the  Pretender — and  is  filled  with 
arguments  in  favor  of  the  House  of  Hanover,  the  Protestant 
succession,  and  a  number  of  elegant  artifices  (compliments 
garnished  with  eloquent  flattery)  to  bring  in  the  fair  portion 
of  the  inhabitants  of  Great  Britain  to  the  side  of  the  exist 
ing  government.  These  papers  are  the  best  of  the  series. 
As  a  specimen  of  the  work  we  make  the  following  extracts 
from  it,  and  which  are  in  the  Freeholder's  happiest  vein. 
They  are  transcribed  from  the  fourth  number,  entitled,  "  Rea 
sons  why  the  British  Ladies  should  side  with  the  Freehold 
er  :" — "  It  is  with  great  satisfaction  I  observe  that  the  women 
of  our  island,  who  are  the  most  eminent  for  virtue  and  good 
sense,  are  in  the  interest  of  the  present  government.  As  the 
fair  sex  very  much  recommended  the  cause  they  are  engaged 
in,  it  would  be  no  small  misfortune  to  a  sovereign,  though 
he  had  all  the  male  part  of  a  kingdom  on  his  side,  if  he  did 
not  find  himself  king  of  the  most  beautiful  half  of  his  sub 
jects.  Ladies  are  always  of  great  use  to  the  party  they 
espouse,  and  never  fail  to  win  over  numbers  to  it. 

"  Lovers,  according  to  Sir  William  Petty's  computation, 
make  at  best  the  third  part  of  the  sensible  men  of  the  Bri 
tish  nation  ;  and  it  has  been  an  unontro verted  maxim  in  all 
ages,  that  though  a  husband  is  sometimes  a  stubborn  sort  of 
a  creature,  a  lover  is  always  at  the  devotion  of  his  mistress. 


ADDISON    AND    STEELE.  7 

By  this  means  it  lies  in  the  power  of  every  fine  woman  to 
secure  at  least  half  a  dozen  able-bodied  men  to  his  majesty's 
service.Tho  female  world  are  likewise  indispensably  necessary 
in  the  best  cause,  to  managethe  controversial  part  of  them,  in 
which  no  man  of  tolerable  breeding  is  ever  able  to  refute  them. 
Arguments  out  of  a  pretty  mouth  are  unanswerable.     There 
are  many  reasons  why  the  women  of  Great  Britain  should 
be  on  the  side  of  the  Freeholder,  and  enemies  to  the  person 
who  would  bring  in  arbitrary  government  and  Popery.     As 
there  are  several  of  our  ladies  who  amuse  themselves  in  the 
reading  of  travels,  they  cannot  but  take  notice  what  uncom 
fortable  lives  those  of  their  own  sex  lead  where  passive  obe 
dience  is  professed  and  practised  in  its  utmost  perfection.     In 
those  countries  the  men  have  no  property  but  in  their  wives, 
who  are  the  slaves  to  slaves ;  every  married  woman  being 
subject  to  a  domestic  tyrant  who  requires  from  her  the  same 
vassalage  that  he  pays  to  his  sultan.     If  the  ladies  would 
seriously  consider  the  evil  consequences  of  arbitrary  power, 
they  would  find  that  it  spoils  the  shape  of  the  foot  in  China, 
where   the  barbarous  politics  of   the  men  so  diminish  the 
basis  of  the  human  figure,  as  to  unqualify  a  woman  for  an 
evening  walk  or  a  country   dance.      In  the  East  Indies,  a 
widow  who  has  any  regard  to  her  character,  throws  herself 
into  the  flames  of  her  husband's  funeral  pile,  to  show,  for 
sooth,  that  she  is  faithful  and  loyal  to  the  memory  of  her 
deceased  lord.     In  Persia,  the  daughters  of  Eve,  as  they  call 
them,  are  reckoned  in  the  inventory  of  their  goods  and  chat 
tels  :  and  it  is  a  usual  thing  when  a  man  sells  a  bale  of  silk, 
or  a  drove  of  camels,  to  toss  half  a  dozen  women  into  the 
bargain.     Through   all  the  dominions  of  the  great  Turk,  a 
woman  thinks  herself  happy  if  she  can  but  get  the  twelfth 
share  of  a  husband,  and  is  thought  to  be  of  no  use  in  the 


CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

creation,  but  to  keep  up  a  proper  number  of  slaves  for  the 
Commander  of  the  Faithful.  I  need  not  set  forth  the  ill- 
usage  which  the  fair  ones  meet  with  in  those  despotic  govern 
ments  that  he  nearer  to  us.  Every  one  hath  heard  of  the 
several  ways  of  locking  up  women  in  Spain  and  Italy ;  where, 
if  there  is  any  power  lodged  in  any  of  the  sex,  it  is  not 
among  the  young  and  the  beautiful,  whom  nature  seems  to 
have  formed  for  it,  but  among  the  old  and  withered  matrons, 
known  by  the  frightful  names  of  Gouvernantes  and  Duennas. 
If  any  should  allege  the  freedoms  indulged  to  the  French 
ladies,  he  must  own  that  these  are  owing  to  the  natural  gal 
lantry  of  the  people,  not  to  their  form  of  government,  which 
excludes  by  its  very  constitution  every  female  from  power,  as 
naturally  unfit  to  hold  the  sceptre  of  that  kingdom.  Women 
ought  in  reason  to  be  no  less  averse  to  Popery  than  to  arbi. 
trary  power.  Some  merry  authors  have  pretended  to  de 
monstrate,  that  the  Roman  Catholic  religion  could  never 
spread  in  a  nation  where  women  would  have  more  modesty 
than  to  expose  their  inuocent  liberties  to  a  confessor.  Others 
of  the  same  turn  have  assured  us  that  the  fine  British  com 
plexion,  which  is  so  peculiar  to  our  ladies,  would  suffer  very 
much  from  a  fish  diet ;  and  that  a  whole  Lent  would  give 
such  a  sallowness  to  the  celebrated  beauties  of  this  island  as 
"would  scarce  make  them  distinguishable  from  those  of  France. 
I  shall  only  leave  to  the  serious  consideration  of  my  fair 
countrywomen,  the  danger  any  of  them  might  have  been  in 
(had  Popery  been  our  national  religion)  of  being  forced  by 
their  relations  to  a  state  of  perpetual  virginity.  The  most 
blooming  toast  in  the  island  might  have  been  a  nun ;  and 
many  a  lady  who  is  now  a  mother  of  fine  children,  condemn 
ed  to  a  condition  of  life  disagreeable  to  herself,  and  unprofit 
able  to  the  world.  To  this  I  might  add  the  melancholy  ob- 


ADDISON    AND    STKELK.  9 

jects  they  would  be  daily  entertained  with,  of  several  sightly 
men  delivered  over  to  an  unavoidable  celibacy.  Let  a  young 
lady  imagine  to  herself  the  brisk  embroidered  officer,  who 
now  makes  love  to  her  with  so  agreeable  an  air,  converted 
into  a  monk ;  or  the  beau,  who  now  addresses  himself  to  her 
in  a  full-bottomed  wig,  distinguished  by  a  little  leather  black 
scull-cap.  I  forbear  to  mention  many  other  objections,  which 
the  ladies,  who  are  no  strangers  to  the  doctrines  of  Popery, 
will  easily  recollect :  though  I  do  not  in  the  least  doubt  but 
those  I  have  already  suggested  will  be  sufficient  to  persuade 
my  fair  readers  to  be  zealous  in  the  Protestant  cause."  We 
read  no  such  political  writing  at  the  present  day ;  elegance  of 
style  is  considered  as  quite  a  subordinate  matter,  and  plea 
santry  rarely  passes  from  a  paragraph  into  an  article. 

The  Lover,  of  Steele,  is  concerned  with  the  policy  of  Pas 
sion,  and  the  strategy  of  Love.  It  is  a  work  of  sentiment, 
and  peculiarly  a  lady's  journal.  The  passion  of  Love  in  all 
its  multiplied  forms ;  the  affections  of  the  heart  with  all  their 
subtle  windings;  the  various  aspects  of  friendship  are  paint 
ed  with  masterly  skill.  Tales  of  real  life,  and  characters  so 
natural  as  to  seem  almost  living,  occupy  a  large  space,  with  a 
rich  fund  of  sense  and  unpretending  sincerity  of  feeling.  The 
purest  sentiment,  a  facile  wit,  and  polished  gallantry,  are  its 
marked  features.  The  Lover  is  an  avowed  imitation  of  the 
Tattler,  which  is  a  surety  for  the  style  of  its  author.  Like 
that  delightful  collection,  it  contains  its  club,  and  had  letters 
written  to  its  author,  Marmaduke  Myrtle,  gent.  Thoroughly 
acquainted  with  city  life,  and  the  ways  of  the  town,  the  book 
is  full  of  good  advice  of  the  kind  most  needed  in  a  great 
city.  It  is,  besides  this,  a  chart  of  the  shoals  and  quicksands 
of  the  tender  passion,  that  should  be  studied  by  all  youthful 
navigators.  Beyond  this,  it  has  the  additional  attraction  of 


10  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

delightful  illustrative  matter,  incidental  to  the  main  design. 
It  contains  many  admirable  suggestions  of  the  highest  prac 
tical  value,  and  delicate  satire,  with  fine  irony  unequalled 
but  in  the  pages  of  his  friend  and  associate.  Of  these  vari 
ous  fine  qualities  we  shall  endeavor  to  present  examples, 
though  necessarily  brief  and  few.  Here  is  the  portrait  of  a 
Lover  Vagabond,  as  he  calls  the  representation  of  a  certain 
class  of  speculative  rakes.  "  He  has  the  language,  the  air, 
the  tender  glance ;  he  can  hang  upon  a  look,  has  most  ex 
actly  the  veneration  of  face  when  he  is  catched  ogling  one 
whose  pardon  he  would  beg  for  gazing ;  he  has  the  exulta 
tion  at  leading  off  a  lady  to  her  coach  ;  can  let  drop  an  indif 
ferent  thing,  or  call  her  servants  with  a  loudness  and  a  certain 
gay  insolence  rare  enough ;  nay,  he  will  hold  her  hand  too 
fast  for  a  man  that  leads  her,  and  is  indifferent  to  her,  and 
yet  come  to  that  gripe  with  such  slow  degrees,  that  she  can 
not  say  he  squeezed  her  hand,  but  for  anything  further  he 
had  no  inclination"  We  wish  we  could  find  room  for  certain 
delicious  papers,  that  would  be  mutilated  by  mere  extracts. 
Such  are,  the  Battle  of  Eyes  ;  the  tragical  history  of  Penrud- 
dock,  with  the  affecting  correspondence  that  passed  between 
the  husband  and  his  wife  ;  the  story  of  the  Venetian  Count ; 
the  humorous  family  picture  of  the  Crabtrees ;  the  refined 
thoughts  on  making  presents ;  the  account  of  the  Ladies  of 
consideration  ;  and  of  the  young  student  who  was  so  artfully 
taught  to  speak  and  act  for  himself ;  and  a  number  of  elegant 
episodes.  Instead  of  these  we  can  only  copy  a  passage  or  so, 
at  random — generally  selecting  such  as  Labruyere  might 
have  written,  from  their  nicety  and  refinement ;  and  maxims 
with  regard  to  good  breeding,  as  judicious  as  anything  in 
Chesterfield,  at  the  same  time  that  they  have  ten-fold  the 
heart  m  them, 


ADDISON    AND    STEELE.  11 

"  Women  dissemble  their  passions  better  than  men,  but 
men  subdue  their  passions  better  than  women." 

"  There  are  no  inclinations  in  women  which  more  surprise 
me  than  their  passions  for  chalk  and  china.  The  first  of  these 
maladies  wears  out  in  a  little  time  ;  but  when  a  woman  is 
visited  with  the  second,  it  generally  takes  possession  of  her 
for  life.  China  vessels  are  playthings  for  women  of  all  ages. 
An  old  lady  of  fourscore  shall  be  as  busy  in  cleaning  an  In 
dian  Mandarin  as  her  great-grand-daughter  is  in  dressing  her 
baby." 

"  A  too  great  regard  for  doing  what  you  are  about  with  a 
good  grace,  destroys  your  capacity  for  doing  it  at  all." 

"  The  best  way  to  do  a  thing  as  you  ought,  is  to  do  it  only 
because  you  ought." 

"As  for  my  own  part,  I  always  approve  those  who  make 
the  most  of  a  little  understanding,  and  carry  that  as  far  as 
they  can,  than  those  who  will  riot  condescend  to  be  perfect, 
if  I  may  so  speak,  in  the  under  parts  of  their  character." 

" ugly  is  a  woman's  word  for  knavish." 

"  Some  silly  particle  or  other,  as  it  were  to  tack  the  taking 
leave  with  the  rest  of  the  discourse,  is  a  common  error  of 
young  men  of  good  education." 

"  A  good  judgment  will  not  only  supply,  but  go  beyond 
experience  ;  for  the  latter  is  only  a  knowledge  that  directs 
us  in  the  dispatch  of  matters  future,  from  the  consideration 
of  matters  past  of  the  same  nature  ;  but  the  former  is  a  per 
petual  and  equal  direction  in  everything  that  can  happen, 
arid  does  not  follow,  but  makes  the  precedent  that  guides  the 
other." 

The  reader  will  do  well  to  turn  to  the  beautiful  dedication 
to  the  Lover,  a  masterpiece  of  composition,  as  well  as  a  noblo 
effusion  of  friendship  :  the  whole  work  is  of  the  same  texture, 


12  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

and  so  uniformly  attractive  as  to  appear  more  to  advantage 
read  continuously  than  cut  up  into  shreds  and  patches  ;  a  test 
to  be  applied  only  to  works  of  standard  merit,  since  most 
modern  writers  gain  by  transcribing  their  most  elaborate 
passages. 


II. 


TYRONE    POWER* 

Is  certainly  the  prince  of  Irish  actors.  Indeed  we  never  saw 
the  Irishman  even  decently  personated  before  we  saw  this 
admirable  performer,  nor  do  we  conceive  it  possible  for  any 
future  rival  to  disturb  our  opinion  of  him.  Irish  Johnstone  is 
with  the  past :  he  may  have  equalled  Power,  but  we  doubt 
it — we  are  sure  he  could  not  have  surpassed  him.  Power, 
beyond  any  actor  we  ever  saw,  and  we  have  seen  the  best 
that  have  graced  the  boards  of  our  old  Drury,  unites  in  him 
self  the- most  literal  fidelity  with  the  richest  humor  this  side 
of  burlesque.  He  is  always  natural ;  he  is  the  most  pictur 
esque  of  actors.  The  elder  Mathews  had  far  finer  wit,  know 
ledge  of  character  and  invention  ;  his  son  a  more  sparkling 
fancy,  wonderful  quickness,  and  a  keener  wit.  Jack  Reeve 
was  John  Bull  in  grotesque,  and  Keeley  is  nature's  self  in 
little.  In  quiet  humor,  the  last  mentioned  actor  beats  them 
all.  Dowton,  whom  we  saw  in  his  decline,  was  a  serious 
old  gentleman  of  the  sentimental  school.  Charles  Kemble 
was  the  perfection  of  the  genteel  comedian.  All  of  these 
performers  were  gifted  with  a  universality  to  which  Power 
*  1840. 


TYRONE    POWER.  13 

can  lay  no  claim,  and  yet  we  reiterate,  in  his  single  walk  of 
Irishman,  whether  gentle  or  simple,  the  attorney  or  the  tailor, 
the  country  gentleman  or  the  rustic,  the  ambassador  or  the 
valet,  ho  is  the  finest,  most  natural,  most  attractive  actor  the 
stage  now  possesses. 

When  we  first  sat  down  to  sketch  the  character  of  Power's 
acting,  we  thought  to  compare  him  with  Keeley ;  a  close 
analysis  gives  Power  the  palm.  We  say  this  with  a  genuine 
relish  of  the  delicious  quaintness  and  grave  humor  of  Peter 
Spyk  and  Euclid  Facile  :  both  actors  are  men  of  excellent  sense 
but  their  humor  and  fancy  are  different.  Powers  is  a  Rubens 
in  his  rich  colors,  and  Keeley  a  Teniers  in  his  scrupulous  ex 
actness.  Keeley  is  a  Flemish  painter  among  actors ;  cautious, 
thorough,  elaborate.  The  effect  of  his  acting  proves  this, 
though  it  may  not  be  discovered  while  he  is  acting  ;  he  leaves 
a  clear,  fixed  impression  on  the  mind.  This  Power  does  not 
aim  to  create,  or  cannot ;  he  is  more  the  actor  of  impulse,  not 
without  study.  He  has  too  much  nicety  and  neatness  for 
that :  what  we  mean  is,  there  is  more  of  a  riant  spirit,  an 
overflow  of  soul  in  his  acting  than  in  Keeley's,  which  might 
almost  tempt  one  to  say  he  was  a  careless  actor.  Keeiey,  on 
the  contrary,  is  the  most  careful  of  actors,  and  gradually  un 
folds  a  character ;  Power  displays  it  in  the  first  scene.  Both 
are  admirable  characters,  with  quite  opposite  temperaments ; 
and  the  most  we  can  say  is,  that  the  breadth  of  Power's 
humor  is  of  a  more  sympathetic  nature  than  the  depth  of 
Keeley's. 

An  undoubted  proof  of  the  genius  of  Power,  for  such  he 
certainly  possesses,  is  his  constant  freshness.  Acting  in  a 
single  line,  one  might  regard  him  as  liable  to  monotony,  and 
that  lino  comprehending  but  two  ranges  of  character,  diversify 
them  as  you  will.  Now  incidents,  a  new  story,  new  charac- 


14  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

ters  may  come  in,  but  in  every  varying  light,  you  can  find 
either  the  Irish  gentleman,  or  the  Irish  peasant ;  most  deli 
cately  shaded,  most  nicely  discriminated,  yet  only  these  two. 
It  has  been  disputed  whether  Power  can  act  the  Irish  gentle 
man  ;  there  is  no  doubt  he  is  one.  It  is  said,  he  carries  into 
a  genteel  character  the  farcical  conceits  and  low  cunning  that 
distinguished  his  Rory  O'More,  his  Irish  Lion,  Teddy  the 
Tiler,  Looney  M'Twoolter,  and  Dr.  O'Toole.  We  wish  such 
critics  to  go  and  see  his  Irish  Attorney.  If  that  be  not  a 
portrait  of  the  Irish  gentleman  of  a  past  date,  a  harum-scarum 
rattlepate,  but  a  genuine,  humane-hearted  gentleman  withal, 
a  man  of  sense  to  boot,  then  we  know  not  what  such  a  cha 
racter  should  be.  When  Power  chooses,  he  can  assume  the 
port  and  bearing  of  a  finished  gentleman.  In  this  last  men 
tioned  character,  he  is  the  exact  picture  of  a  country  gentle 
man,  who  has  lived  much  among  his  inferiors,  and  caught 
something  of  their  slang  and  style.  His  Irish  Ambassador 
is  not  so  good.  In  O'Callaghan  again  we  see  the  gentleman 
plainly,  though  clad  in  a  rusty  suit  and  worn  beaver.  His 
Sir  Lucius  O'Trigger  we  never  saw ;  but  the  Park  company 
could  not  sustain  such  a  comedy  as  the  Rivals.  Where  would 
be  the  Acres,  Sir  Anthony,  the  Captain  Absolute,  the  Lydia 
Languish  ?  To  be  sure  we  would  have  the  best  of  Mrs.  Mal- 
aprops,  in  Mrs.  Wheatley.  We  would  have  a  judicious  actor 
in  Mr.  Chippendale,  whatever  part  he  assumed  ;  and  a  toler 
able  one  in  Placide,  whose  powers  have  been  overstated. 
But  we  want  Charles  Kemble,  Jack  Reeve,  Farren,  and  Mrs. 
Jordan,  or  Miss  Chester,  or  Miss  Kelly,  if  the  play  were  to 
be  cast  as  it  deserved. 

Excellent  as  is  Mr.  Power's  Irish  gentleman,  his  peasant 
must  be  confessed  beyond  all  praise  :  it  is  perfection.  In  the 
White  Horse  of  the  Peppers,  he  leaves  for  a  time  his  original 


A    FEW    HOMERIC    NODS    IN    MR.    HALLAM.  15 

character,  which  is  that  of  an  Irish  cavalier,  and  assumes  that 
of  a  bog-trotter.  The  vast  difference  is  seen  at  once.  If  he 
were  good  in  the  first,  and  such  he  certainly  was,  he  was  ex 
cellent  in  the  last. 

Another  proof  of  Mr.  Power's  merit  is,  that  he  is  the  piece. 
In  all  the  plays  he  performs,  his  character  is  not  only  the 
main  character,  but  the  only  character  of  importance  ;  and 
yet  he  so  fills  up  the  stage  and  the  play,  that  he  makes  poor 
actors  play  well  in  his  company.  Other  stars  shine  by  them 
selves  alone  ;  Power  shines  in  his  own  person,  and  through 
the  rest  of  the  company  by  a  reflected  light.  In  a  word, 
Power  is  the  herald  of  mirth  and  good  humor  wherever  he 
comes  ;  we  greet  his  honest  face  with  joy  on  the  stage,  or  in 
the  street,  and  cannot  help  regarding  him  as  a  much  greater 
and  better  friend  to  humanity  than  a  score  of  professed  raoral- 
izers  who  never  touch  the  heart. 


III. 

A  FEW  HOMERIC  NOUS  IN  MR.  HALLAM. 

HISTORIES  of  literature  in  general  prove  very  unsatisfactory. 
The  ground  they  cover  is  too  wide  ;  the  topics  discussed  too 
multifarious ;  the  space  for  each  very  limited.  There  is  more 
of  the  narrative  talent  employed  in  them  generally  thnn 
critical  acumen.  A  historical  line  of  writers  is  deduced,  and 
the  genealogy  of  the  various  schools  of  literature  and  the  mu 
tations  of  taste  and  fashion  are  presented;  but  the  individual 
traits  of  single  writers,  unless  those  of  the  first  class,  are  too 
often  overlooked,  and  the  rare  merits  of  minor  writings,  which 


16  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

are  in  less  regard  because  less  known,  cast  almost  entirely  in 
the  shade,  or  else  unfaithfully  noticed.  This  general  fault  ap 
plies  to  the  three  most  prominent  histories  of  literature  with 
which  the  modern  scholar  is  acquainted — the  works  of 
Schlegel,  Sismondi  and  Bouterwek.  The  late  Introduction 
to  the  Literature  of  Europe  in  the  fifteenth,  sixteenth  and 
seventeenth  centuries,  by  Mr.  Hallam,  is  open  to  the  same 
objections,  and,  if  we  are  not  greatly  mistaken,  to  a  wider 
and  more  prejudicial  extent. 

The  capacity  and  requisite  attainments  on  the  part  of  a 
historian  of  European  letters,  would,  if  rigorously  tested  in 
the  person  of  Mr.  Hallam,  incline  one  to  place  his  pretensions 
and  to  rate  his  performance  rather  lower  than  the  press  and 
the  reading  public  generally  have  thought  proper  to  ascribe 
to  him.     The  true  position  of  this  author  in  the  literary  re 
public,  has  been  well  defined  by  Macaulay,  as  that  of  a  liberal, 
fair  and  accurate  historian.     But  it  will  be  readily  seen  that 
the  very  qualities  that  best  fit  Hallam  for  this  department 
are  the  least  appropriate  to  him  in  his  new  character.     The 
cool  decisions  and  rigidly  impartial  statements  of  the  narrator 
of  civil  and  military  occurrences,  and  of  the  speculatist  on  the 
political  aspects  of  states  and  nations,  diminish  the  influence 
of  a  literary  spirit  cherished  with  enthusiasm  and  kept  fresh 
by  a  natural  and  healthy   sympathy  with  men  of  genius. 
Hence  we  find  the  statesman  and  political  economist  has  here 
got  the  better  of  the  literary  critic  and  the  genuine  man  of 
letters.     Mr.  Hallam  is  a  man  of  varied  acquirements,  much 
industry,  and  a  correct  judgment  on  points  where  he  is  well 
versed ;  but  his  work  is,  after  all,  little  better  than  a  cata 
logue  raisonne;  and  in  that  section  of  it  most  interesting  to 
the  English  reader — the  department  of  old  English  prose  and 
poetry — lamentably  deficient,  not  only  in  a  just  appreciation 


A    FEW    HOMERIC    NODS    IN    MR.    HALL  AM.  17 

of  the  glories  of  the  reigns  of  Elizabeth,  of  James,  and  of 
Charles  I.,  but  also  in  some  of  the  common  details  with  which 
every  gentleman  of  moderate  reading  is  supposed  to  be  ac 
quainted.  All  questions  of  speculative  theology  and  theo 
retical  politics,  the  antiquarian  history  of  the  first  editions  of 
the  classics,  and  the  early  translations  of  the  Bible,  the  pro 
gress  of  Oriental  learning,  and  similar  heads,  are  well  and 
learnedly  handled.  The  great  defect  of  the  writer  is  seen 
when  he  comes  to  speak  of  the  minor  prose  literature  of  Eng 
land  in  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries,  and  where 
those  recondite  niceties  and  delicate  traits  that  test  the  fine 
critic,  pass  either  without  observation  or  are  ignorantly  and 
almost  insolently  treated.  A  feeling  of  the  beauties  of  an 
obscure  author  of  merit  is  as  rare  in  the  world  of  books,  as 
the  honest  appreciation  of  a  worthy  man,  who  lives  out  of  the 
world,  and  is,  perhaps,  underrated  by  the  few  to  whom  lie  is 
known,  as  in  the  circles  of  society.  Not  only  candor  but  also 
ingenuity  is  wanted,  in  a  critic  of  this  description.  The  critic 
has  candor,  but  is  by  no  means  an  ingenious  man  in  any  of 
his  works,  and,  we  apprehend,  not  so  well  informed  on  these 
very  topics  as  he  ought  to  be.  On  this  latter  suggestion 
alone  can  we  account  for  several  false  reports  and  very  inade~ 
quate  decisions.  We  have  marked  many  instances,  but  shall 
at  present  quote  but  a  few. 

Mr.  Hallam  writes  thus  of  Jeremy  Taylor:  "His  sen 
tences  are  of  endless  length,  and  hence  not  only  altogether 
unmusical,  but  not  always  reducible  to  grammar."  Of  Donne 
and  Cowley,  he  gives  the  old  Johnsonian  criticism,  which  has 
been  amply  refuted  over  and  over  again.  He  speaks  oi 
South  as  he  is  currently  mentioned,  merely  a  witty  court 
preacher,  and  says  not  a  word  of  his  vigorous  eloquence.  Of 
Hammond's  biblical  annotations  he  treats  at  length,  but  adds 


18  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

not  a  syllable  of  the  sermons  of  the  English  Fenelon.  Of 
Marvel,  says  Hallara, — "His  satires  are  gross  and  stupid  ;" 
(/)  while  the  critic  writes  this  sentence  of  Crashaw,  "  It  is  dif 
ficult  in  general  to  find  anything  in  Crashaw  that  bad  taste 
has  not  deformed"  (!!)  Among  the  Shaksperian  commentators 
he  mentions  Mrs.  Montague,  and  others  inferior  even  to  her, 
but  omits  altogether  any  reference  to  Hazlitt  or  Lamb.  One 
of  the  most  flagrant  instances  of  a  want  of  proper  reverence 
for  the  finest  writers  of  the  finest  period  of  English  literature, 
is  to  be  seen  in  his  notice  of  the  Mermaid  tavern  :  "  the  oldest 
and  not  the  worst  of  clubs."  The  circle  in  which  Mr.  Hallam 
moves  in  perhaps  more  courtly  and  aristocratical.  His  idol, 
Mr.  Hookham  Frere,  possesses  "  admirable  humor ;"  but  poor 
Owen  Feltham,  forsooth,  who  wrote  the  first  century  of  his 
Resolves  at  the  age  of  eighteen,  and  lived  the  life  of  a  de 
pendant,  is  a  harsh  and  quaint  writer,  full  of  sententious  com 
monplaces.  This  young  man  offers  a  striking  example  of  an 
early  maturity  of  judgment,  and  of  the  union  of  genuine 
pathos  and  fanciful  humor.  His  little  volume  will  be  read 
with  gratification  a  century  hence,  and  by  a  larger  class  than 
now  peruse  it,  and  we  dare  affirm  with  more  pleasure  than 
the  long  and  inaccurate  volumes  of  Hallam. 

Mr.  Hallam's  judgments,  often  assuredly  caught  from 
second  sources,  are,  when  original,  those  of  a  critic  with  the 
taste  of  Dr.  Blair ;  a  strange  union  of  French  criticism  and 
reverence  for  classic  models  current  in  the  early  part  and 
until  almost  the  close  of  the  last  century.  He  gives  an 
opinion  of  Addison,  to  which  no  reader  of  varied  acquisition, 
or  of  broad  views  of  the  present  day,  could  by  any  possibility 
assent.  After  Lamb  and  Hazlitt's  admirable  criticisms,  we 
cannot  read  with  patience  the  labored  cautiousness  of  Mr 
Hallam,  on  the  old  English  dramatists.  Our  author's  notices 


A    FEW    HOMERIC    NODS    IN    MR.    II  ALL  AM.  19 

of  the  old  divines  are  too  much  a  history  of  their  polemical 
works,  and  the  views  of  their  pulpit  eloquence  either  borrowed 
or  else  confused. 

Lest  the  popular  admiration  for  genius  of  the  popular  sort 
should  run  wild,  he  sneeringly  alludes  to  a  certain  class  of 
critics,  who  would  erect  the  John  Bunyans  and  Daniel  De- 
foes  into  the  gods  of  their  idolatry.  The  historian  would 
himself  peradventure  substitute  Dr.  Lingard  and  Sharon 
Turner,  his  brother  historians,  or  a  pair  of  biblical  critics,  or 
High  Dutch  commentators.  There  are  critics  who  measure 
an  author's  works  by  the  company  he  keeps,  or  the  clothes  he 
wears.  We  suspect  Mr.  Hallam  to  bo  one  of  those  who 
would  treat  Sir  Harris  Nicholas  or  the  head  of  a  college  with 
unfeigned  respect,  but  not  allow  himself  to  be  ensnared  into 
the  vulgar  society  at  Lamb's  Wednesday-evening  parties, 
where  Coleridge,  Wordsworth,  Hazlitt,  Godwin,  Hunt,  and  a 
host  of  the  most  brilliant  men  of  the  age,  met  to  converse 
freely,  like  men,  and  not  like  litterateurs  or  namby-pamby 
followers  of  noble  lords. 

The  history  of  English  literature  alone  is  much  too  com 
prehensive  a  subject  for  any  one  man.  Mr.  D'Israeli,  who  ad 
vertised  his  intention  of  attempting  it,  has  been  wisely  disap 
pointed.  The  curiosities  of  literature  he  has  a  more  real  love 
of,  than  for  the  simple  beauties  of  prose  or  poetry.  He  might 
have  compiled  merely  a  collection  of  rare  facts  and  curious 
fragments,  valuable  for  their  suggestive  matter  to  the  student, 
but  quite  inadequate  for  a  philosophical  history  of  literature. 
The  best  criticisms  are  contained  in  classic  lives,  in  letters,  and 
the  ablest  review  articles,  in  the  lectures  of  Hazlitt,  and  the 
essays  of  Lamb  and  Leigh  Hunt.  With  these  writers,  Mr. 
Ilallam  may  in  nowise  compete,  and  we  trust  he  will  follow 
the  bent  of  his  natural  inclinations,  in  turning  over  state 


20  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

papers  and  government  documents,  and  display  his  peculiar 
ability  in  sifting  the  measures  of  a  party,  and  following  up 
the  consequences  of  a  bill  or  a  statute.  For  literary  criticism, 
his  cold  temperament  and  negative  taste  are  ill  adapted. 
They  incline  him  to  look  on  the  frank  relation  of  an  author's 
feelings  as  offensive  egotism,  and  wholly  obscure  his  per 
ception  of  characteristic  individuality  or  marked  personal 
traits. 


IV. 


RELIGIOUS    NOVELS. 

A  CERTAIN  class  of  prose  fictions  is  included  under  the  above 
general  term,  which,  from  Bunyan  to  Brownson,  is  and  ever 
has  been  exceedingly  popular.  They  are,  for  this  reason,  to 
be  closely  scrutinized,  as  their  scope  and  tendency  may  prove 
productive  either  of  great  good  or  considerable  injury,  not 
only  to  the  cause  or  literature,  but  even  to  the  cause  of  vital 
religion  and  Christian  morality.  The  phrase,  "  Religious 
Novels,"  comprehends  equally  those  works  written  professedly 
to  favor  or  satirize  particular  sects  and  creeds,  and  those 
works  which,  with  a  more  general  and  popular  interest,  still 
aim  to  take  a  high  stand  on  all  questions  of  morality,  and  to 
be,  in  effect,  text-books  of  ethics  and  casuistry. 

A  general  objection  that  strikes  one  at  once,  on  the  very 
face  of  the  matter,  is  with  regard  to  the  intention  and  spirit  of 
these  and  similar  productions.  Is  a  novel,  we  would  ask,  the 
proper  vehicle  for  religious  sentiment  and  moral  instruction  ? 


RELIGIOUS    NOVELS.  21 

We  would  not  be  misunderstood.  We  sincerely  believe  that 
every  good  book,  even  of  the  lightest  character,  should  carry 
jts  moral  with  it,  and  that  a  good  moral.  What  we  doubt  is> 
whether  the  morality  of  the  book  should  be  made  offensively 
prominent,— should  stand  foremost,  casting  all  its  other  me 
rits  into  the  background  ,  or  whether  it  should  not  lie  covert 
and  unpretendingly  under  a  cheerful  face  of  humble  docility 
Pope  has  wisely  advised  us  that 

"  Men  should  be  taught  as  if  we  taught  them  not ; 
And  things  unkn9icn,  as  things  forgot." 

The  skilful  man  of  the  world— the  Sir  Politic  Would-be  of 
this  generation, — always  reminds  and  never  informs  directly. 
"  The  agreeable  man  is  he  who  agrees."  So  the  judicious 
moralist,  if  at  the  same  time  a  writer  of  fiction,  conceals  his 
moral  under  a  veil  of  fancy's  weaving,  and  impresses  a  so 
lemn  truth  on  our  hearts,  whilst  he  is  delighting  the  imagin 
ation  or  instructing  the  reason.  This  palpable  error  of  over 
doing  the  matter,  being  "  too  moral  by  half"  (always  smack 
ing  of  hypocrisy),  has  been  remarked  by  the  ablest  critical 
and  aethetical  philosophers  ;  but  it  is  a  vulgar  error  of  such 
frequent  occurrence  as  to  call  for  as  frequent  animadversion. 
It  is  not  necessary  that  every  book  should  contain  a  confession 
of  faith,  nor  comprehend  a  code  of  religious  precepts.  Every 
biography  is  not  of  a  good  man  ;  some  histories  must  relate 
the  successes  of  bad  men  and  evil  principles.  Novels,  of  all 
books,  are  permitted  to  be  least  didactic  and  hortatory  (to  em 
ploy  a  Johnsonian  phrase).  We  hate  misnomers.  A  book 
of  devotion,  a  tract  of  conversial  divinity,  a  sermon,  a  moral 
essay,  are  all  well  in  their  proper  place  ;  but  a  book  professing 
to  be  a  novel,  but  which  is,  in  fact,  a  sham  novel,  a  mere 
cover  for  the  introduction  of  a  work  of  another  class,  under  its 


22  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

name,  is  a  forgery,  a  falsehood,  a  contemptible  piece  of  de 
ception.  The  title  may  be  assumed  to  gain  a  wider  circle  of 
readers  (it  may  be  a  fetch  of  the  author's,  or  a  trick  of  the 
publisher's),  but  that  affords  no  just  excuse  for  falsifying  its 
character  by  giving  it  a  name  that  means  something  directly 
the  reverse.  Lord  Peter,  in  the  Tale  of  the  Tub,  endeavored 
to  make  a  loaf  of  bread  to  stand  for  "  fish,  flesh  and  fowl," 
but  such  is  now  a  stale  cheat.  It  is  for  bread,  giving  a  stone, 
in  the  language  of  Scripture.  It  is  virtually  telling  a  false 
hood.  No  honest  man  could  countenance  such  an  imposi 
tion,  evidently  a  piece  of  Jesuitical  policy.  The  defender  of 
the  practice  would  argue,  probably,  the  purity  of  his  inten 
tion  and  the  goodness  of  the  end  to  be  reached  :  for  "  a  verse 
may  take  him  whom  a  sermon  flies ;"  shielding  himself 
under  these  batteries  from  the  charge  of  employing  unfair 
means. 

We  have  a  word  more  to  say  on  this  head.  We  urge,  a 
novel  is  not,  as  a  matter  of  course,  to  be  a  moral  treatise  or 
ecclesiastical  horn-book  (all  good  works  of  fiction  presuppose 
the  essentials  of  religion  and  the  reality  of  virtue) ;  but, — 
and  here  we  join  with  the  strictest  religionists, — if  it  pretend 
directly  to  teach  morals  or  religion  at  all,  it  must  teach  pure 
doctrine  and  sound  ethics.  It  is  essential,  primarily,  that  it 
be  consistent  with  itself  and  faithful  to  nature.  Let  an  exact 
picture  of  life,  and  manners,  and  character  be  presented,  with 
out  any  formal  comment  or  prefatory  analysis  ;  give  charac 
ter,  and  feeling,  and  principle  fair  play  ;  let  opposites  contend, 
and  then  good  will  be  apparent,  evil  be  manifest.  Allure 
ments  will  be  offered  to  virtue,  and  vice  be  her  own  corrector. 
No  danger  need  be  apprehended  from  too  close  fidelity  of 
description,  for  in  that  case  the  evil  will  correct  itself.  Gross- 
ness  is  repulsive  enough  ;  it  is  the  elegant  voluptuousness  of 


RELIGIOUS    NOVELS.  23 

polished  vice  that  is  so  baleful  and  pernicious.  By  all  means 
to  be  avoided  is  the  hateful  paradox  of  painting  good  infidels, 
or  cold  skeptics  with  all  the  virtues  of  humanity.  And  some 
who  pass  for  mere  skeptics,  have  a  natural  religion  and  a 
pious  benevolence  in  their  hearts,  which  they  do  not  dream 
of,  and  do  not  profess.  Such  was  "  the  good  David"  (Hume), 
the  friend  and  almost  the  idol  of  Adam  Smith,  and  Macin 
tosh,  and  Mackenzie. 

We  have  mentioned  two  classes  of  religious  novels.  Under 
the  first  denomination  would  fall  Bunyan's  Pilgrim  and  Holy 
War,  Patrick's  Imitation  (taken  by  Gray  as  a  standard  of 
dullness),  the  Spiritual  Quixote,  Walker's  Vagabond,  Ccelebs 
in  search  of  a  Wife,  and  later  fictions  of  a  somewhat  similar 
character  by  De  Wette  and  Brownson.  These  are  but  a  few. 
Of  the  second  description  are  the  novels  of  Defoe,  Richardson, 
Dr.  Moore,  Johnson's  Rasselas,  and  a  vast  collection  of  moral 
tales,  by  Marmontel,  and  Cottin,  and  De  Genlis,  and  Chateau 
briand,  and  St.  Pierre,  with  a  thousand  others. 

A  striking  defect  is  common  to  the  above  works,  and  the 
religious  biographies, — the  heroes  are  made  perfect ;  they  are 
morally  and  intellectually  accomplished,  and  unite  the  piety 
of  the  saint  to  the  polish  of  the  gentleman.  They  are  liter 
ally  "  just  men,  that  need  no  repentance."  Instead  of  being 
represented  as  human  and  fallible,  they  are  painted  as  so  pure 
and  immaculate  as  to  preclude  us  from  sympathy  with  weak 
ness  or  failure,  and  leave  nothing  for  the  mind  but  stupid  ad 
miration.  We  are  called  by  the  creators  of  these  models  of 
superhuman  excellence  to  fall  down  and  do  homage  to  the 
idols  of  their  fancy,  the  gods  of  their  idolatry,  as  to  our  liege 
exemplars.  The  characters  themselves,  by  their  monotony  of 
merit,  into  which  no  particle  of  folly  is  allowed  to  intrude,  are 
made  tiresome  and  unnatural.  They  are  flattered  into  the 


24  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

most  disgusting  form  of  vanity — spiritual  conceit.  They  are 
moral  and  religious  coxcombs.  "  It  is  the  man,  Sir  Charles 
Grandison,"  is  the  constant  exclamation  of  praise.  The 
morality  of  these  novels  is  moral  pedantry.  It  is  as  different 
from  true  moral  wisdom  as  genuine  learning  is  different  from 
the  pedantry  of  books  and  colleges.  The  morality  of  ethical 
novels  is  generally  a  conventional  mannerism:  the  preten 
sions  to  piety  savor  of  Puritanical  assumption.  The  religious 
conversations  are  often  blasphemous,  from  their  absurd  and 
presumptuous  familiarity.  We  read  a  sort  of  RELIGIOUS 
SLANG,  too  often  found  even  in  the  pulpit ;  by  which  we  in 
tent  to  express,  a  stereotyped  repetition  of  phrases,  employed 
without  any  definite  meaning,  and  in  an  indifferent,  careless 
spirit.  The  most  serious  Christian  cannot  avoid  allowing  the 
existence  of  cant,  which  is  more  injurious  in  religion  than 
anywhere  else.  In  religious  novels,  any  expression  of  this 
kind  exposes  the  work  to  the  sneers  of  wicked  men,  as  well 
as  to  the  intelligent  censure  of  the  critic,  who  is  no  scoffer. 

One  description  of  religious  novels,  that  might  be  better 
styled  moral  satires,  if  not  carried  out  into  burlesque  or  dis 
figured  by  liberality,  may  be  the  vehicle  of  sound  argument 
and  pointed  rebuke.  The  Vagabond,  by  Walker,  is  a  book  of 
this  nature.  Such,  also,  we  conceive  the  Spiritual  Quixote  to 
be  ;  a  satire  directed  against  the  Methodists  and  their  extra 
vagances. 

Bunyan,  the  first  of  religious  writers,  was  an  allegorical 
painter  with  little  of  the  satirist.  He  has  nothing  in  com 
mon,  as  a  mere  writer,  with  later  writers  of  religious  fiction, 
— Hannah  More,  for  instance.  Pilgrim's  Progress  is  dramatic 
and  spiritual ;  Coelebs  is  a  tract  on  the  art  of  selecting  a 
wife,  transformed  into  the  shape,  the  figure  "  extern,"  of  a 
novel.  Bunyan  gives  us  pictures ;  Hannah  More  furnishes 


RELIGIOUS    NOVELS.  25 

us  with  sermons  and  moral  dissertations.  Bunyan  is  a  poet ; 
Mrs.  More  is  a  proser.  Ilannah  More's  true  field — and  there 
she  was  admirable — (for,  in  spite  of  many  drawbacks,  she  had 
great  talent),  was,  prose  fiction  in  the  shape  of  moral  tracts 
(good  Sunday  reading)  for  the  plainer  class  of  people,  and 
which  would  impress  many  wholesome  truths  on  readers  of 
all  classes.  She  was  also  a  good  writer  for  children  beyond 
infancy  and  on  the  confines  of  boyhood  or  girlhood.  She 
wanted  genius  to  open  the  minds  and  address  the  fancy  of 
very  young  children  ;  and  she  wanted  breadth  and  originality 
for  maturer  men  and  women  of  education  and  experience. 

We  come,  finally,  to  this  conclusion,  with  regard  to  the 
morality  of  the  novel  as  a  work  of  art  ;  and  we  find  our 
idea  so  justly  and  distinctly  enunciated  by  Hazlitt,*  that  we 
borrow  his  language  :  "  The  most  moral  writers,  after  all,  are 
those  who  do  not  pretend  to  inculcate  any  moral.  The  pro 
fessed  moralist  unavoidably  degenerates  into  the  partizan  of  a 
system  ;  and  the  philosopher  is  too  apt  to  warp  the  evidence 
to  his  own  purpose.  But  the  painter  of  manners  gives  the 
facts  of  human  nature,  and  leaves  us  to  draw  the  inference ; 
if  we  are  not  able  to  do  this,  or  do  it  ill,  at  least  it  is  our  own 
fault."  In  the  same  way,  a  philosophic  historian  will  prefer 
the  transcript  from  contemporary  records  to  any  fine-spun 
dissertations  of  his  own  ;  and  an  effective  orator  will  allow  a 
clear  and  spirited  statement  of  facts  to  do  the  work  of  a 
labored  declamation. 

There  have  been  warm  discussions  on  this  point,  to  wit, 
whether  every  work  of  art  should  have  a  direct  moral  ? 
Goethe  and  his  disciples  contended  that  it  should  not ;  that, 
questionless,  a  deep  lesson  was  to  be  learnt,  not  appearing, 
however,  on  the  surface  of  the  work,  but  to  be  educed  and 

*  Lectures  on  the  Comic  Writers. 
2 


26  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

evolved  after  study  and  earnest  meditation.  Coleridge  boasted 
that  a  principal  beauty  of  his  "  Ancient  Mariner"  consisted  in 
its  being  without  an  avowed  moral,  at  which  good  Mistress 
Barbauld  was  mightily  shocked.  Not  having  a  formal  mora, 
did  not  impair  the  essential  morality  of  the  poem.  This 
speech  of  the  poet  was  analogous  to  his  praise  of  Shakspeare's 
•women,  that  they  were  characterless  ;  recipients  of  virtue, 
and  reflectors  of  it,  but  not  stiff,  moral,  heartless  prudes.  The 
great  poet  detested  pretence,  and  most  of  all  moral  pretences. 
He  saw  a  great  and  deep  truth,  which  the  mass  can  never 
comprehend,  or,  if  they  did,  could  not  appreciate,  and  which 
must  ever  remain  a  dark  problem  to  many  well-meaning  and 
well- taught  (in  other  respects),  but  pragmatical  persons.  For 
a  man  can  only  see  with  what  eyes  he  has,  and  with  none 
other.  Optical  aids  furnish  optical  delusions  ;  and  thus  truth 
is  perverted,  because  the  percipient  wants  a  true  vision. 

The  novel  is  a  classic  form  of  composition  ;  it  has  proved 
the  vehicle  of  consummate  knowledge  of  life  and  character  ; 
it  comprehends  and  includes  exquisite  descriptions  of  nature, 
and  beauty,  and  comic  traits,  and  pathetic  situations  ;  it  paints 
the  manners,  and  developes  the  sentiments.  It  is  familiar 
history  and  popular  philosophy ;  but  we  apprehend  it  is  not 
the  proper  form  of  writing  to  be  selected  for  the  propagation 
of  religious  opinions,  or  the  instilling,  in  a  didactic  manner, 
of  moral  sentiments.  We  would  be  very  far  from  excluding 
either ;  but  we  maintain  that  they  should  be  subsidiary  rather 
than  glaring;  incidental  not  prominent.  Palpable  display 
only  invites  attack,  and  stimulates  rude  jests, 

With  all  the  love  in  the  world  for  good  literature,  and 
none  the  less  for  novels  of  the  good  old  stamp,  as  a  portion 
of  literature,  we  yet  confess  religion  is  too  holy  a  thing  to 
be  bandied  about  in  lively  dialogue,  or  defended  with  the 


RELIGIOUS    NOVELS.  27 

supercilious  condescension  of  arrogant  eloquence.  Other 
forms  of  composition  are  better  adapted  to  impress  moral 
precepts,  or  warm  by  pure  devotion,  or  excite  by  passionate 
appeals,  or  enlighten  by  the  inductions  of  reason.  The  divine 
music  of  sacred  poesy  is  reviving  from  the  lethargy  in  which 
she  lay  buried  for  the  greater  part  of  the  eighteenth  century. 
The  rich  strains  of  the  minor  religious  poets  of  the  seven 
teenth  century  are  now  reproduced,  and  rising  from  a  new 
choir  of  contemporary  bards.  The  songs  of  Zion  fascinate 
the  sense,  while  they  purify  the  heart.  The  well  of  life  re 
quires  no  such  filtering  as  the  poisoned  fountain  of  Helicon, 
to  drink  only  of  the  pure  essence  of  poesy.  The  pulpit  is 
more  especially  the  source  whence  should  flow  invigorating 
streams  of  the  water  of  the  River  of  Life,  to  cneer  and  fortify 
the  soul.  That  these  ends  are  not  in  all  cases  so  answered, 
is  a  crying  evil.  The  history  of  good  men,  who  have  actually 
lived  and  struggled  with  temptation  and  fortune,  if  truly  and 
dramatically  related,  should  at  least  equal  a  fictitious  narra 
tive  of  the  ideal  good  man.  The  history  of  the  church  is  a 
history  of  human  nature,  and  full  of  rich  instruction.  For 
direct  precept  or  discussion,  the  moral  essay,  the  review,  the 
religious  periodical,  are  always  open.  And  it  is  indeed  mat 
ter  of  especial  wonder  how,  with  the  rich  theological  litera 
ture  of  England,  any  poverty  should  be  felt  of  religious  read 
ing  for  the  most  fastidious  scholar  ;  or  the  necessity  of  resort 
to  novels  for  doctrinal  or  practical  instruction.  Perhaps  the 
best  thing  to  be  done,  is,  with  all  humility  and  respect  for 
the  great  names  and  greater  minds  of  the  elder  English 
writers,  to  point  out  the  several  excellences  of  each,  and 
thereby  persuade  to  a  study  and  contemplation  of  them. 
This  we  have  always  honestly  endeavored  to  do,  however 
feeble  or  imperfect  may  have  been  the  execution  of  our  pur 
pose. 


v. 

LITERARY   AMBASSADORS.* 

THE  recent  appointment  of  two  of  the  most  elegant-minded 
men  our  country  has  yet  produced,  as  foreign  ministers  to 
two  of  the  most  powerful  courts  of  the  old  world,  has  led  us 
to  the  consideration  of  the  many  great  authors,  sometimes 
poets,  who  have  heretofore  graced  the  same  honorable  office, 
and  thence  our  subject  has  carried  us  into  incidental  reflec 
tions  on  the  connection  subsisting  between  politics  and  litera 
ture.  Our  country,  we  may  remark  in  passing,  is  not  only 
safe,  as  certain  cautious  writers  observe,  in  such  hands  as 
those  of  the  accomplished  Everett  and  the  tasteful  Irving,  but 
it  is  even  highly  honored  by  such  representations.  Since  her 
earliest  connection  with  us,  England  has  never  given  us  so 
fair  a  specimen  of  her  race  as  we  now  present  her  with ; 
except  perhaps  when  the  amiable  enthusiast,  the  eloquent 
Bishop  of  Cloyne,  visited  our  shores.  And  Spain,  since  the 
days  of  Cervantes,  has  been  unable  to  exchange  with  us  the 
equal  of  Washington  Irving.  Our  two  great  countrymen 
may  compare  in  literary  merit  and  social  worth  with  the 
lettered  statesmen  of  an  earlier  age  in  England's  literary  his 
tory,  and  are,  with  the  Sidneys,  the  Wottons,  the  Herberts, 
of  a  purer  epoch. 

From  the  earliest  dawn  of  civilisation,  the  ruler  has  been, 
in  the  noblest  instances,  always  something  more  than  a  mere 
ruler.  He  has  been  often  a  priest ;  frequently,  an  orator ; 
and  sometimes  a  poet.  Moses,  and  David,  and  Solomon, 
among  the  Jews — Pericles  was  an  orator  and  a  critic :  De 
mosthenes,  a  great  orator :  Cicero,  a  moralist  and  rhetorician : 
*  1842. 


LITERARY    AMBASSADORS.  29 

Ccesar,  a  general,  an  author,  an  orator,  and  indeed  an  uni 
versal  genius.  But  to  confine  ourselves  to  great  Englishmen 
alone,  and  to  those  of  that  nation  employed  in  embassies, — 
Dan  Chaucer,  the  morning  star  of  English  poetry,  was  sent 
abroad  on  a  political  errand,  and  passed  the  greater  part  of 
his  life  at  the  courts  of  Edward  III.  and  Richard  II.  In  the 
time  of  Henry  VIII.  we  meet  the  names  of  the  courtly  Surrey, 
the  poet  and  lover,  as  well  as  the  knight  and  courtier,  and 
the  all-accomplished  Lord  Herbert  (elder  brother  to  George 
Herbert).  Spenser  was,  if  we  are  not  mistaken,  entrusted 
with  a  commission  of  statistical  survey,  or  something  of  the 
sort,  which  led  to  his  work  on  Ireland.  All  the  great  prose 
writers  and  poets  of  Elizabeth's  time  took  a  deep  interest  in 
policy,  except  the  dramatists.  At  home,  Bacon,  and  Bur- 
leigh,  and  Selden,  and  Hooker,  and  Coke :  "  abroad,  in 
arras,"  Sidney  and  Raleigh  (twin  brothers  in  genius  and 
glory),  aad  those  gay  rivals  for  the  favor  of  the  maiden 
queen,  Essex  and  Leicester.  The  great  dramatists  seem  to 
have  been  too  deeply  and  too  delightfully  engrossed  in 
creating  fair  visions  of  their  own,  to  trouble  their  heads  much 
with  the  concerns  of  this  sublunary  planet. 

The  reigns  of  the  first  two  Stuarts  were  highly  favorable 
to  letters,  both  in  church  and  state.  Then  were  the  high 
loyalist  divines  well  rewarded  for  their  learned  devotion  and 
eloquent  zeal.  Then  arose  that  galaxy  of  brilliant  names, 
Taylor,  and  South,  and  Barrow,  and  Donne  ;  and  that  rare 
class  who  combined  the  elegant  scholar,  the  high  church 
man,  the  accurate  man  of  business,  the  high-toned  royalist, 
and  the  fine  gentleman,  in  a  proportion  and  degree  we  have 
seldom  seen  since.  Of  this  class  was  Sir  Henry  Wotton,  who 
was  sent  abroad  on  three  several  missions  of  an  important  na 
ture,  and  finally  ended  his  days  as  provost  of  Eton  college. 


30  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

His  name  is  embalmed  for  ever  in  the  epitaph  of  Cowley, 
and  his  fame  perpetuated  in  the  artless  gossip  of  Izaac  Walton. 
Howell,  the  letter-writer,  was  employed  in  the  same  way. 
So,  too,  was  Dr.  Donne,  who  went  to  France  as  secretary  to 
his  noble  patron ;  Cowley  filled  a  similar  station  ;  and 
Quarles,  who  at  one  period  was  cup-bearer  to  the  famous 
and  beautiful  queen  of  Bohemia.  The  list  of  great  names 
might  be  much  lengthened  by  reference  to  books ;  but  we 
are  quoting  from  memory. 

During  the  commonwealth  the  claims  of  literature  were 
by  no  means  overlooked.  The  parliamentary  leaders  were 
men  of  education,  as  well  as  of  great  natural  abilities  ;  Pym, 
Hampden,  and  Sir  Harry  Vane.  The  sagacious  Protector 
himself  selected  the  best  men  for  his  own  service.  The  great 
est  poet  of  all  time  was  the  private  secretary  of  Cromwell, 
and  his  assistant  Marvell  was  a  true  patriot  and  man  of  fine 
genius.  Howe  and  Owen,  the  two  greatest  divines  of  that 
day,  were  the  Protector's  chaplains.  The  former  of  these 
Robert  Hall  pronounced  to  be  superior  to  all  the  divines  he 
had  ever  read,  and  to  have  given  him  more  just  ideas  on 
theological  subjects.  The  latter  was  the  champion  of  the 
Independents,  and  is  still  regarded  by  his  sect  as  a  Hercules 
in  controversial  theology. 

On  the  restoration  of  Charles  II.,  those  divines,  and  law 
yers  and  scholars,  who  had  given  their  support  to  his  cause 
by  their  passive  sufferings,  as  well  as  by  their  active  exer 
tions  with  tongue  or  pen,  were  in  general  amply  rewarded. 
The  noble  historian  of  the  great  rebellion  was  created  Lord 
Chancellor.  The  imprisoned  divines  were  restored  to  their 
pulpits.  Defenders  of  the  faith  and  adherents  of  the  king 
suddenly  rose  from  the  condition  of  country  curates  to  the 
offices  of  bishop  and  archbishop  :  court  poets  were  ennobled, 
and  wits  were  in  the  ascendant. 


LITERARY    AMBASSADORS.  31 

But  at  the  revolution  arose  another  change ;  the  whigs 
then  came  into  power,  and  whig  writers  were  favored  ac 
cordingly.  Addison  and  Steele  were  favorites  with  their 
party  from  their  political  tracts,  as  they  were  with  the  pub 
lic  from  their  wit,  and  humor,  and  style,  and  knowledge  of 
life.  Garth,  the  favorite  whig  physician,  was  also  a  popular 
poet.  The  same  claim  gave  reputation  even  to  the  prosy 
blockhead,  Blackmore  ;  and  both  were  knighted  for  their 
loyalty.  The  English  La  Fontaine  (with  greater  licentious 
ness),  Prior,  was  sent  to  France.  Newton  was  made  master 
of  the  mint,  and  the  rest  were  well  provided  for.  The  great 
tory  writers  were  continually  depressed,  and  gained  no  favor 
from  the  public  save  that  which  their  brilliant  poems  extorted. 
Among  these  were  Pope ;  Swift,  who  never  got  beyond  his 
deanship,  because  he  could  not  stoop  for  a  bishopric;  the 
amiable  humorist,  Arbuthnot;  the  charming  Gay;  the  pen 
sive  Parnell.  Two  tory  leaders,  Bolingbroke  and  Atterbury, 
were  even  driven  into  exile,  from  which  the  latter  never 
returned. 

Coming  down  to  our  own  time,  we  may  observe  the  close 
alliance  between  politics  and  law,  and  politics  and  literature. 
The  great  public  characters  of  the  state,  of  this  century,  have 
been  for  the  most  part  originally  lawyers  :  the  Cannings,  and 
Peels,  and  Broughams  of  England,  and  the  Adamses,  the 
Pinckneys,  and  the  Websters  of  America.  Of  letters,  the 
chiefs  too,  the  Scotts,  and  Words  worths,  the  Coleridges,  and 
Carlyles,  the  Hazlitts,  and  the  Macauleys,  have  taken  a  deep 
interest  in  the  issue  of  certain  political  questions,  too  often 
mere  party  questions.  In  many  cases,  the  leaders  in  litera 
ture  have  held  prominent  offices  in  some  one  of  the  depart 
ments  of  government.  The  connection  of  poetry  with 
politics  is  not  hard  to  make  out.  The  ardor  of  devotion, 


CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

whether  to  a  king  or  to  a  great  abstract  principle  of  right,  in 
either  case  exerts  a  most  important  effect  upon  the  imagina 
tion.  Where  power  is  embodied  and  personified,  as  in  a 
kingly  government,  more  outward  pomp  is  exhibited,  but  less 
by  far  of  a  high  moral  elevation  of  sentiment,  than  is  seen  in 
the  severe  beauty  and  stern  dignity  of  republicanism.  Cato 
is  a  nobler  character  for  the  mind  to  dwell  upon  than  Charles 
of  England  ;  and  George  Washington  is  a  greater  name 
than  Frederick  or  Catherine. 

A  natural  alliance  is  also  easily  formed  between  high 
churehmanship  and  royalty,  and  that  poetry  which  is  capti 
vated  by  the  splendor  of  both ;  and  yet  the  finest  description 
of  cathedral  music  has  come  from  the  pen  of  a  puritan  poet 
(vide  II  Penseroso) :  and  the  most  eloquent  passage  on  the 
French  revolution  from  the  tory  poet  Wordsworth. 

The  common  objection,  that  literary  pursuits  incapacitate  a 
man  for  business,  has  been  long  since  refuted  by  Bacon  and 
a  host  of  writers  down  to  the  time  of  Addison.  The  accuracy 
and  nicety  that  certain  studies  impart  fit  one  admirably  for 
the  employments  of  legislation  and  diplomacy.  The  in 
variably  good  effects  of  meditation  and  study  on  mental 
discipline,  and  the  growth  of  the  intellectual  powers, 
are  also  discernible  in  every  human  employment,  and  can 
unfit  a  man  for  nothing.  Poets  alone,  it  may  be  conceded,  if 
not  originally  gifted  with  a  robust  moral  constitution,  may 
easily  allow  an  effeminate  sense  of  beauty  to  obscure  their 
sense  of  rugged  truths.  The  greatest  poets,  however,  Dante 
and  Milton,  have  been  the  firmest  political  philosophers  and 
patriots.  The  Moores  and  Cornwalls  of  the  time,  might 
easily  sink  and  faint  beneath  the  heat  and  burden  of  the  day. 
In  our  own  country,  Bryant  and  Dana  would  fight  to  the  last 
for  the  principles  of  justice  and  liberty  :  our  butterfly  versi- 


LITERARY    AMBASSADORS.  33 

fiers  only  would  become  intimidated  by  the  frown,  and  quail 
beneath  the  glances  of  power.  American  authors  of  the  first  r 
rank  are,  without  exception,  warm  advocates  of  the  principles 
of  a  pure  democracy,  untainted  by  any  mixture  of  radicalism. 
There  are  Bancroft,  the  first  historian ;  Channing,  the  finest 
moral  essayist,  and  Hawthorne,  the  most  original  prose-poet, 
not  only  of  our  day,  and  of  American  literature,  but  of  our  age, 
and  of  English  literature.  These  are  all  devoted  to  the  cause 
of  truth,  liberty,  justice,  and  public,  as  well  as  private,  honor. 

Generally  the  selection  of  an  ambassador  at  a  foreign 
court  is  a  matter  left  to  mere  hireling  politicians,  or  deter 
mined  on  insufficient  or  impartial  grounds.  But  the  repre 
sentative  of  a  great  nation  should  be  a  great  man.  Ingenuity 
is  not  so  much  wanted  as  innate  tact  directing  solid  wisdom. 
A  gentleman  is  to  be  preferred  before  what  is  commonly 
called  a  genius.  Where  there  are  many  ceremonials,  less 
talent  is  wanted.  Occasions  arise,  nevertheless,  where  pro 
found  sagacity  is  needed,  and  where  the  weight  of  character 
is  invaluable.  Still,  where  elegance  of  mind  and  of  manners 
may  both  be  found  united ;  where  a  talent  for  negotiation 
and  public  business  is  farther  set  off  by  a  brilliant  elocution, 
with  a  fund  of  intellectual  resources  and  personal  accom 
plishments, — there,  we  have  finished  public  character,  and 
such  we  conceive  to  be  no  more  than  a  just  sketch  of  our 
minister  to  England.  Mr.  Irving,  we  suspect,  is  less  of  a  man 
of  business,  but  he  has  other  claims  to  prefer.  He  is  the 
historian  of  Columbus  :  he  has  charmed  thousands  by  his 
romantic  tales  and  picturesque  descriptions  of  Spain.  His 
state  duties  will  be  in  all  probability  much  less  arduous  than 
those  of  his.  illustrious  compeer,  and  consequently  demand 
less  of  the  diplomatic  talent. 

We  conclude  then,  as  we  began,  by  congratulating  our 
2* 


34  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

countrymen  on  the  possession  of  such  representations  abroad : 
men  to  be  honored  and  reverenced  now,  and  to  be  known  as 
classical  writers  and  elegant  gentlemen,  to  all  future  ages. 


VI. 

THE    PROSE    STYLE    OF    POETS. 


HAZLITT'S  view  is,  that  poets  write  bad  prose  for  a  variety  of 
reasons,  which  we  will  consider  in  order.  In  the  course  of 
his  essay,  (on  the  same  subject,  and  bearing  the  same  title,) 
he  lays  down  certain  positions  that  we  cannot  regard  as  ten 
able,  and  shall  consequently  attempt  to  show  their  unsound- 
ness.  The  paper  was  probably  written  to  attract  attention 
rather  than  to  decide  the  dogma;  it  is  brilliant  and  half 
true,  but  only  half  true.  It  contains  some  very  fine  special 
pleading,  and  certainly  many  valuable  hints ;  but  it  is  written 
to  suit  a  theory,  in  defiance  of  facts,  and  from  too  narrow  a 
generalization.  We  shall  try  to  avoid  doing  injustice  (even 
while  advocating  the  opposite  side)  to  the  real  merits  of  the 
essay ;  to  dwell  upon  the  beauty,  acuteness  and  eloquence  of 
which,  might  alone  occupy  the  space  of  a  separate  criticism. 
The  principal  arguments  our  critic  employs  to  confirm 
his  decision  are  these :  Poets,  in  writing  prose  (strange  as 
it  seems),  display  a  want  of  cadence,  have  no  principle  of 
modulation  in  the  musical  construction  of  their  periods  ;  but 
missing  rhyme  or  blank  verse,  the  regular  accompaniment  to 
which  their  words  are  to  be  said  or  sung,  fall  into  a  slovenly 
manner,  devoid  of  art  or  melody.  The  prose  works  of 


THE    PR08E    STYLE    OF    POETS.  35 

Sydney,  Milton,  Cowley,  Dryden,  Goldsmith  and  Dana, 
afford  instances  sufficient  to  disprove  this  assertion.  At  the 
same  time  it  must  be  confessed,  that  rhyme  has  helped  out 
many  a  bold  thought  and  expanded  (by  rhetorical  skill) 
many  a  half  formed  idea.  It  is  no  less  true  that  certain 
eminent  poets  have  as  assuredly  failed  in  attaining  a  first 
rate  prose  style,  as  certain  capital  prose  writers  have  failed  in 
writing  even  tolerable  verse.  We  agree  with  Hazlitt,  that 
Byron's  prose  is  bad,  inasmuch  as  he  aims  to  make  it  too 
effective ;  trying  to  knock  down  and  stun  an  antagonist  with 
the  latter  end  of  a  sentence,  as  with  the  butt-end  of  a  coach 
whip.  Coleridge's  prose,  too,  is  not  inaptly  compared  to  the 
cast-off  finery  of  a  lady's  wardrobe.  The  poet's  prose  muso 
being  a  sort  of  hand-maiden  to  his  poetical  (and  true)  mis 
tress,  and  tricked  out  in  the  worn  out  trappings  of  the  latter, 
and  ornaments  at  second  hand.  The  Ancient  Mariner,  Love, 
the  sonnets,  tragedies,  and  occasional  poetry  of  this  author, 
are  master-pieces :  but  his  Watchman  and  Conciones  ad 
Populum  have  been  honestly  censured  as  mere  trash. 

Hazlitt  is  very  caustic  in  his  remarks  on  poetical  prose, 
and  with  great  justice.  It  is  the  weakest  of  all  sorts  of 
prose;  we  prefer  to  it  the  very  baldest  expression,  so  it  is 
only  precise  and  clear.  And  so  far  from  manifesting  rich 
ness  of  fancy  or  imagination,  it  is  proof  only  of  a  good 
memory  and"  a  liberally  stocked  wardrobe  of  metaphorical 
commonplaces.  It  is  the  style  of  most  sentimental  writers, 
of  the  majority  of  orators,  of  fashionable  preachers,  and 
mystical  philosophers.  It  is  not  the  style  of  a  manly 
thinker,  of  a  man  who  has  anything  to  say,  or  of  a  man  of 
genius.  No  great  orator  or  logician  employs  it ;  we  find  it 
in  no  popular  manuals  of  philosophy  or  politics.  It  is  never 
used  by  a  sood  historian  or  a  great  novelist,  nor  indeed  by 
any  one  who  can  write  anything  else. 


36  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

The  critic  gives  a  further  reason  for  the  bad  prose  style  of 
the  poets.     He  says,  the  same  liberty  of  inversion  is  not  to 
be  allowed  in  prose  that  prevails  in  poetry :  that  there  is 
more  restraint  and  severity  in  prose  composition.     Yet  what 
can  be  more  rigorous  than  the  laws  of  verse  ;  what  style  so 
compressed  and  close,  yet  so  pithy  and  "matter-full,"  as  the 
style  of  the  finest  poets?     Truth,  adds  the  author  of  Table- 
Talk,  is  the  essential  object  of  the  prose-man  (we  suspect  he 
meant  the  philosopher,  from  the  authorities  that  follow)  :  but 
beauty  is  the  supreme  intent  of  the  poet.     At  the  present 
day,  have  we  not  learnt  a  better  lesson  than  this,  after  the 
teaching  of  centuries  ?      Is  not  the  poet  the  moralist  and 
"  right  popular  philosopher  2"     Do  we  not  learn  the  truest 
and  deepest  metaphysics  (so  far  as  we  can  learn  that  internal 
and  individual  science  from  books)  from  the  best  poets:  do 
we  not  obtain  our  highest  ethical  maxims  and  our  truest 
sesthetical  views  from  the  same  sources  ?     Doth  not  the  poet 
impress  our  hearts  and  arouse  our  inmost  sympathies,  with 
a  skill  far  superior  to  that  of  the  priest  or  seraphic  doctor  ? 
But  we  need  not  dilate  upon  that  head,  nor  repeat  in  plain 
terms,  the  comprehensive  and  philosophical  picture  of  the 
true  poet,  drawn  by  one  (Sidney)  of  the  greatest  and  most 
eloquent  of  the  craft,  in  the  rich  and  glowing  colors  of  fancy. 
Hazlitt  has  very  strangely  fallen  into  the  obsolete  doctrines 
of  Johnson  and  the  Anglo-Gallic  school  of  criticism  (the 
English  pupils  of  Dubos,  Bossu  and  Bouhours) ;   that  plea 
sure  is  the  highest  aim  of  the  poet :  that  his  noblest  powers 
tend  only  to  amuse  or  recreate.     This  is  true  of  the  minor 
and  lighter  poets,  but  not  of  poets  of  the  first  class.      It 
holds  with  regard  to  Swift  and  Prior,  not   to  Milton  or 
Wordsworth.      It   refers  more   correctly   to  purely  fanciful 
poets,  than  grandly  imaginative  writers.      To  restrict  our- 


THE    PROSE    STYLE    OF    POETS.  37 

selves  to  a  single  nation — the  Hebrews.  Is  David,  or  Job, 
or  Solomon,  a  "pretty"  poet:  do  their  writings  furnish 
merely  entertainment  ?  Are  they  not  rather  profoundly 
instructive*  as  well  as  sublime  and  impassioned  ?  Is  Homer, 
or  Dante,  a  trifler :  or  are  we  to  estimate  Shakspeare  and 
JEschylus  as  ordinary  playwrights  ?  Every  critical  tyro 
knows  better.  But  our  critic  reduces  the  question  to  one  of 
metaphysical  morality.  He  says,  in  part  truly,  as  others 
have  written  before  him,  that  fortitude  is  not  the  character- 
istical  virtue  of  poets.  This,  too,  is  a  hasty  assertion :  it  is 
not  the  virtue  of  the  majority  of  the  poets,  nor  of  the  mass 
of  mankind,  but  it  is  a  distinguishing  trait  of  the  largest 
souls.  If  Milton  and  Dante,  Johnson  and  Scott,  possessed 
not  this  noble  virtue,  there  were  none  ever  did.  And  look  at 
the  manly  resolution  of  Burns,  of  Elliott,  of  Bryant,  of  Dana, 
of  Cowper,  and  of  Wordsworth.  If  these  are  not  teachers 
of  long  suffering  and  patient  endurance,  we  know  not  where 
such  are  to  be  found. 

From  the  want  of  sufficient  self  command,  reasons  Hazlitt 
the  poets  have  been  unable  to  conquer  a  sense  of  beauty,  by 
which  they  were  fascinated  and  had  become  enslaved.  Nor 
need  they  to  conquer  it,  save  when  opposed  to  truth,  a  higher 
and  rarer  form  of  intellectual  beauty.  Truth  is  more  beauti 
ful  than  what  we  ordinarily  style  beauty,  or  rather  the 
highest  truth  is  beauty  itself  in  the  abstract.  Sensual  beauty 
is  truth  materialized,  and  derives  its  charms  from  the  union 
of  proportion,  fitness,  utility,  and  an  innate  harmony — what 
Ilazlitt  meant  is,  that  poets  too  much  regard  ornament,  and 
fall  in  love  with  their  own  figurative  fancies,  worshipping  the 
idols  they  have  set  up  in  their  own  imaginations,  of  their  own 
creation,  like  the  heathen  of  old.  They  seem  to  mistake 
fiction  for  fact,  and  rather  dally  with  fancy  than  are  filled 


38  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

with  faith.  They  accumulate  beautiful  metaphors  without 
regard  to  their  connection  or  logical  sequence.  This,  again, 
we  conceive  to  be  palpably  a  misrepresentation.  Where 
are  the  reasoning  Pope  and  Dryden ;  that  master  of  the 
argumentum  ad  absurdum,  Butler;  those  logicians  of  the 
parlor,  Swift  and  Prior,  and  Wolcot  and  Moore  ?  Where  is 
the  whole  race  of  metaphysical  poets  placed  ?  Then,  too,  the 
large  class  of  professedly  didactic  or  speculative  poets  from 
Hesiod  to  Wordsworth,  what  becomes  of  them?  Where 
is  the  critical  Churchill,  the  moral  Johnson,  the  religious 
Cowper  ?  In  fact,  the  poets  are  the  greatest  reasoners,  the 
most  accurate,  brief  and  pointed,  conveying  an  argument  in 
a  couplet,  and  a  syllogism  in  a  line.  The  Germans  and 
Coleridge  have  settled  the  doctrine  of  the  logical  method  of 
imagination,  in  her  (apparently)  wildest  career,  and  that  she 
has  a  law  and  sequence  of  her  own,  not  to  be  measured  by 
mechanical  reasons.  It  must  be  conceded,  besides,  that  poeti 
cal  teaching  is  more  beautiful  than  the  lessons  of  the  prose- 
man  ;  that  fancy's  illustrative  coloring  affords  a  grateful  relief 
to  the  over-worked  reason.  In  effect,  too,  the  most  captivat 
ing  pictures  afford  the  strongest  arguments ;  an  illustration 
is  always  an  argument  by  analogy,  a  descriptive  syllogism, 
or  reasoning  by  picture. 

We  have  thus  concisely  and  categorically  responded  to  the 
different  points  of  objection,  but  we  lay  very  little  stress  on 
any  remarks  of  our  own,  except  they  be  confirmed  by  a  bul 
wark  of  testimony.  Fortunately,  we  have  a  strong  defence 
of  this  kind,  behind  which  to  entrench  ourselves  from  sudden 
assaults,  and  we  shall  not  hesitate  to  avail  ourselves  of  the 
forces  we  have  been  able  to  collect.  Sydney,  our  earliest 
prose  writer,  of  classic  rank,  who  was  also  a  poet,  was  almost 
equally  successful  in  both  departments,  and  in  his  Defence  of 


THE    PROSE    STYLE    OF    POETS.  39 

Poesy,  at  least,  a  writer  of  pure,  clear,  sweet  Virgilian  prose. 
Hall's  contemplations  rival  his  versified  satires,  and  are  equally 
excellent;  the  magnificent  declamation  of  Milton  and  the 
natural  eloquence  of  Cowley  are  celebrated,  yet  the  sermons 
of  Donne,  and  the  prose  characters  of  Samuel  Butler,  are  not 
to  be  forgotten.  Quarles  was  no  less  close  and  pointed  in  his 
Enchiridion  than  in  his  Emblems.  There  are  the  letter- 
writers,  Pope,  Gray  and  Cowper,  with  Burns,  Charles  Lamb, 
and  our  own  Willis.  Even  Hazlitt  allows  the  perfect  prose 
style  of  Dryden  ;  yet  the  name  of  Goldsmith  has  been  singu 
larly  overlooked. 

Respectability  in  poetry  is  intolerable  ;  yet  we  allow  many 
degrees  of  excellence  in  prose.  Third-rate  poets  sometimes 
have  been  converted  into  prose  writers  of  the  second  class. 
Swift  and  Addison  are  known  chiefly  by  their  prose  :  they 
wrote  clever  verse  also  ;  no  one  would  call  either  a  great  poet, 
yet  they  were  great  writers.  Johnson's  Rasselas,  and  the 
Lives  of  the  Poets,  place  the  prose  writer  where  neither  Irene 
nor  London  could  by  any  possibility  have  placed  him.  Shen- 
stone's  maxims  and  essays  more  than  counterbalance  all  his 
poetical  works,  with  the  exception  of  the  Schoolmistress. 

Where  poets  fail  in  prose,  it  is  from  a  want  of  the  more 
prosaic  elements  of  composition.  Coleridge,  for  instance 
had  little  practical  shrewdness,  though  an  imagination  second 
only  to  Milton's,  and  much  as  Campbell's  prose  is  at  present 
censured  (the  causes  of  the  weakness  of  which  and  of  his  ill- 
success  in  book  making,  latterly,  are  evident),  let  any  one 
turn  to  his  early  essay  on  English  Poetry,  if  he  would  find  a 
model  of  beauty  supported  by  strength  and  judgment,  refined 
by  art. 

The  poets  are  not,  moreover,  the  best  prose  writers,  but  in 
comparably  the  best  critics,  especially  of  each  other.  The 


40  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

vulgar  error  of  the  envy  existing  among  men  of  genius,  is  as 
baseless  as  is  the  opinion  that  a  fine  poet  is  necessarily  a  weak 
critic,  or  the  supposition  that  his  imagination  is  too  strong 
for  his  judgment.  The  greatest  poets  are  not  ignorant  oracles 
of  wisdom,  but  elaborate  artists,  who  can  give  a  reason  for 
most  of  their  works,  though  the  very  rarest  melodies  of  their 
lyre  are  struck  by  a  divine  impulse  above  and  beyond  their 
command.  There  existed  a  crude  and  narrow  notion  of  the 
critic  formerly:  that  he  was  a  spiteful,  malicious  libeller, 
rather  than  an  honest  judge  and  admiring  advocate.  The 
Queen  Anne  wits  appeared  to  consider  a  good  critic  to  be  the 
reverse  side  of  a  bad  poet,  as  the  best  vinegar  was  made  out 
of  the  vilest  cider.  To  pick  flaws  in  reputations  and  writiags 
once  made  a  man's  fame.  Now,  we  know  a  little  better.  We 
can  believe  genuine  criticism  to  be  a  labor  of  love,  and  the 
fruit  of  enthusiastic  reverence. 

Philosophical  poetry  is  the  deepest  criticism,  in  the  hands 
of  the  master-bards,  Horace,  Pope,  Wordsworth  and  Dana. 
We  entirely  believe  with  Owen  Felltham,  that  "  a  grave  poem 
is  the  deepest  kind  of  writing."  Dramatic  composition  is,  of 
all  others,  the  most  artificial  form  of  writing— and  we  find 
the  first  tragic  and  comic  writers  profoundly  conversant  with 
the  principles  of  their  art,  learned  Ben,  the  judicious  Beau 
mont,  witty  Congreve.  So,  too,  the  early  classical  translators 
into  English,  were  philologists  and  critics  of  necessity,  Fairfax 
and  Chapman.  The  musing  Drummond  has  left  his  judg 
ment  of  books  behind  him— Dryden  has  written  the  best 
characters  of  Beaumont,  and  Fletcher,  and  rare  Ben,  that  any 
critic  has  yet  done  ;  and  he  has  left  nothing  for  later  writers 
to  impair  or  add  to  his  portrait  of  Shakespeare.  "Glorious 
John's"  prefaces  are  models  of  their  kind,  and  the  earliest 
specimens  of  good  criticism  in  England.  Shakspeare  and 


THE    PROSE    STYLE    OF    POETS.  41 

Milton,  from  the  perfection  of  their  works,  we  naturally  infer 
to  have  been  exquisite  critics. 

Butler,  by  his  satire  on  the  abuse  of  learning,  and  ridicule 
of  the  French,  has  disclosed  a  vein  of  caustic  criticism.  Cow- 
ley  was  a  critic  and  philosopher,  even  more  than  a  poet ;  he 
thoroughly  appreciated  the  most  opposite  styles  of  poetry, 
the  Pindaric  and  Anacreontic.  "  The  Phenix  Pindar,"  he 
has  truly  written,  "  is  a  vast  species  alone,"  and  consequently, 
he  is  himself  little  more  than  an  able  follower,  a  capital  imi 
tator  ;  but  the  spirit  of  Anacreon  he  has  caught  with  won 
derful  felicity,  and  paraphrased  him  in  a  style  immeasurably 
beyond  Tom  Moore.  In  truth,  the  Anacreontics  of  Cowley 
surpass  even  the  gay  flashes  of  Anacreon,  in  spirit  and  effect. 
Charles  Second's  wits  were  shrewd,  sharp  men  of  the  world, 
satirists,  and  critics,  not  to  be  imposed  upon  by  pretension. 
Of  this  assertion,  the  Duke  of  Buckingham's  Rehearsal  is  a 
proof,  and  an  inimitable  satire — Rochester,  Waller,  St.  Evre- 
mond,  Roscomraon,  were  all  clear  and  discriminating  critics  ; 
but  their  judgment  did  not  reach  very  far. 

Pope's  finest  philosophical  poem  is  his  Essay  on  Criticism ; 
and  the  best  imitators  of  Pope — Johnson  and  Rogers — are 
essentially  critics  with  widely  different  tastes  :  Johnson  rudely 
masculine,  and  Rogers  delicate  and  fastidious  to  effeminacy. 

To  come  to  the  present  century ;  where  do  we  read  finer 
critical  fragments  than  in  Coleridge's  Table  Talk,  and  the 
notes  to  Lamb's  Dramatic  Specimens  ?  Shelley  was  a  meta 
physical  critic.  Hunt  and  Lamb  are  perhaps  the  most  deli 
cate.  The  papers  on  Lear  and  on  Shakspeare's  tragedies  are 
the  very  finest  criticisms  ever  penned  on  that  most  fertile 
theme  of  eulogy — the  Shakspearian  Drama.  Leigh  Hunt 
has  written  a  body  of  the  most  agreeable,  if  not  the  protbun- 
dest,  criticism  of  his  time.  Mr.  Dana  has  produced  articles 


42  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

on  Kean's  acting  and  Shakspeare  that  entitle  him  to  rank 
with  Lamb  and  Hunt. 

As  a  general  rule,  the  best  prose  writers  are  the  safest 
critics  for  ordinary  reading,  if  only  from  the  absence  of  any 
possible  competition.  Where  they  rank  with  the  greatest 
critics,  it  is  from  the  large  share  they  possess  of  the  poetical 
temperament,  and  of  fancy.  The  critic  should  be  half  poet, 
half  philosopher  ;  with  acute  powers  of  analysis,  a  lively  fancy, 
deep  sensibility,  and  close  reasoning  faculties.  This  is  a  very 
rare  combination  ;  yet  Hazlitt,  Rousseau,  and  Emerson,  might 
be  placed  in  this  category,  with  a  scare  or  two  of  names  be 
sides,  taken  from  the  vast  array  of  miscellaneous  authors. 
The  poet  ranks  first,  the  critic  immediately  below  him ;  and 
the  two  united,  each  first  of  his  class,  combine  to  form  the 
highest  instance  of  imagination  and  intellectual  power. 


VII. 


THE    MORALITY    OF    POVERTY. 

POVERTY  is  a  comparative  term.  Between  the  extremities  of 
pauperism  and  that  moderate  competence,  which  the  wealthy 
speak  of  with  contempt,  as  a  poor  pittance,  and  which  is  cer 
tainly  trifling  in  comparison  with  their  "  unsunn'd  heaps,"  the 
interval  is  very  wide.  The  condition  of  the  verv^poor  we  do 
not  take  into  consideration,  at  present,  as  the  main  topic  of 
our  inquiry,  though  we  shall  by  no  means  omit  to  speak  of 
them  in  turn ;  but  we  shall  endeavor  to  present  a  picture  of 


THE  MORALITY  OF  POVERTY.  43 

simplicity  and  moderation  in  living,  and  the  advantages  of  a 
sufficient  competence  (paradoxical  as  it  may  be  thought)  over 
an  overgrown  and  superfluous  income. 

Poverty  has  many  significations,  with  a  wide  range,  em 
bracing  tho  pauper  and  the  poor  gentleman,  aye,  and  the 
poor   noble,   in   some   countries.      Kings    even    have   been 
beggars,  and  have  subsisted  on  casual  bounty.      The  mil 
lionaire  thinks  all  men  poor,  who  are  not  possessed  of  equal 
wealth  with  himself;  while  the  day  laborer  regards  the  small 
trader  and  master  mechanic  as  rich  men.      In  towns,  one 
standard  of  wealth  prevails ;  in  the  country  it  is  much  lower. 
Thus  we  find  an  ever  varying  measure  of  the  goods  of  for 
tune.     Of  a  nobler  species  of  wealth,  it  is  not  so  difficult  to 
ascertain  the  true  value-     An  excellent  book  is  yet  to  be 
written  for  the  rich,  which   should   inform  them  of  their 
duties  towards  their  poorer  neighbors ;  which  should  resolve 
the  claims  the  poor  have  upon  them,  from  the  claims  of 
nature,  as  well  as  from  conventional  position  ;  which  should 
confirm  them  in  habits  of  benevolence  and  in  the  practice  of 
"assisting  the  brethren."     By  assistance,  we  refer  not  merely 
to  alms-giving,  that  being  regarded  as  a  fundamental  part  of 
charity.     But  we  also  include  under  that  phrase,  the  giving 
of  wise  and  disinterested  counsel :  defending  from  oppression 
and  slander :  persuading  to  the  practice  of  right  and  justice  : 
warning  from  evil,  by  instilling  good  principles  and  generous 
sentiments  :  and  in  the  comprehensive  language  of  Scripture, 
loving  our  neighbor  as  ourself,  and  consequently  acting  for 
him  as  if  for  ourself.     Higher  charity  than  this,  is  none  :   a 
charity  the  richest  may  be  too  poor  to  bestow  ;  a  charity  the 
poorest  may  prove  rich  in  dispensing.      If  love  abounded, 
what  a  rich  world  would  not  this  planet  become !     If  man 
was   to   man  a   brother   and   a  friend   (at   the   same  time 


44 


CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 


increasing  the  world's  gear  not  a  copper,  and  neither  intro 
ducing  any  fantastical  schemes  of  agrarian  equality),  in  all 
the  relations  of  life  and  family,  as  master  and  servant,  father 
and  son,  brother  and  companion,  artist  and  artisan,  in  sick 
ness  and  in  health,  at  home  or  abroad,  there  could  be  no 
poverty,  no  disappointment,  and  none  but  natural  sorrows. 
For  though  many  sources  of  grief  would  still  continue  fresh 
and  open,  as  sickness,  death,  loss  of  friends  and  family,  and 
failure  in  favorite  plans  of  life  and  action,  yet  they  would  be 
so  mitigated  by  an  universal  tenderness,  and  so  suffered  by  a 
general  sympathy,  as  to  lose  half  their  sharpness  in  losing  all 
their  repulsive  features.  No  disappointments  could  then 
occur,  because  sincerity  and  plain  dealing  would  take  the 
place  of  falseness  and  deceit.  None  but  a  self-tormenter 
could  then  be  unhappy,  where  all  would  become  companions 
in  good  and  evil  seasons,  and  through  every  changing  round 
of  fortune's  wheel.  But  this  is  an  ideal  not  soon  to  be 
recognized. 

A  man  without  a  penny  has  yet  what  all  the  wealth  in  the 
world  cannot  purchase— the  human  form  and  the  human 
nature.  With  these,  if  he  has  health  and  resolution,  he  may 
become  anything,  except  what  can  be  reached  only  by  innate 
genius  or  a  higher  order  of  mental  gifts  than  his  own.  Give 
him  education,  you  make  him  a  scholar ;  breeding,  you  train 
him  a  gentleman;  religion  and  morality,  and  you  fill  him 
with  the  sentiments  of  a  Christian.  Let  no  one  say,  the 
poor  scholar  or  the  poor  gentleman  is  hurt  by  his  education 
and  manners.  Pride  often  distorts  those  characters,  but  they 
ought  to  be  above  pride.  A  cultivated  mind,  so  far  from 
being  trammelled  by  a  narrow  income,  flies  beyond  it,  and 
taste,  the  quality  of  the  fine  intellect,  is  a  faculty  of  selection. 
The  wisest  economy  is  the  nicest  taste.  Profusion  is  tasteless. 


THE    MORALITY    OF    POVERTY.  45 

A  man  of  fine  judgment  and  small  income  will  actually  live 
in  a  more  genteel  style,  than  a  rich,  coarse-minded  nabob. 
He  may  have  fewer  articles  of  expense,  but  they  will  be 
choice  and  delicate.  His  style  of  living  will  be  frugal,  yet 
elegant ;  which  is  more  pleasing  than  extravagance  without 
judgment.  A  genteel  taste  in  living  eschews  extravagance, 
pomp,  and  all  superfluity,  as  essentially  vulgar.  There  is  not 
a  more  pitiful  sight  than  a  mean-spirited  man  in  a  splendid 
house.  His  soul  is  too  small  for  it.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
great  heart  cannot  be  contained  within  the  most  magnificent 
palace,  and  yet  may  content  itself  in  the  most  humble  man 
sion.  The  great  and  good  poor  man,  in  his  modest  and 
retired  parlor,  affords  a  nobler  spectacle  than  a  king  or  a 
pyramid. 

Riches  too  often  excite  absurdity  of  conduct:  the  giver  of 
the  gorgeous  feast  gets  only  a  rich  harvest  of  ridicule  for  his 
pains  and  anxiety.  The  master  of  an  immense  establishment 
is  little  better  than  the  landlord  of  a  great  hotel.  Guests 
enter  and  depart :  he  is  pushed  aside  as  a  stranger  and  in 
the  way.  All  this  whilo  his  personal  gratifications  are 
limited.  The  poor  soul !  he  lives  for  others,  his  wealth  is  for 
others.  He  is  nobody  himself — but  go  to  the  house  where 
the  man  is  greater  than  the  mansion,  and  you  forget  the  bare 
walls  unhung  with  admirable  paintings,  for  his  face  and  the 
countenances  of  a  loving  circle  are  the  finest  portraits  in  the 
world;  you  tread  on  a  carpet  without  reflecting  it  is  no 
Brussels  pattern,  and  you  sit  easily  on  a  chair  that  has  no 
satin  cushions  for  the  indolent  parvenus  of  fashions.  If  a 
man  is  not  rich,  how  much  he  avoids :  from  how  many  petty 
distractions  is  he  not  free  ?  Plutus  is  even  a  severer  master 
than  Necessity. 

In  point  of  respectability  the  difference  is  great.     Hardly 


46  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

without  an  exception,  the  ancient  families  of  this  country,  the 
descendants  of  the  statesmen,  and  lawyers,  and  heroes  of  the 
revolution  (our  only  real  aristocracy),  are  poor.  The  rich 
class  are,  in  the  great  majority  of  cases,  sprung  originally 
from  the  lowest  class,  who  have  acquired  wealth  by  cunning 
and  pernicious  habits  ;  without  education,  without  sentiment ; 
governed  by  no  laws  of  courtesy,  subservient  to  no  dictates 
of  the  Spiritual  Philosophy;  coarse-minded  and  coarse- 
mannered,  but  clothed  in  purple  and  fine  linen,  and  faring 
sumptuously  every  day.  With  such  as  these,  poverty  of 
spirit  and  want  of  pelf  are  synonymous  terms.  The  poor 
rich  man  and  the  rich  poor  man  are  the  most  perplexing 
problems. 

Authors  and  professed  scholars,  excluded  as  in  great 
measure  they  are  from  amassing  a  fortune,  and  ill  paid  for 
their  elaborate  labors,  are  among  the  objects  of  especial  pity, 
not  to  say  contempt  (pitiable  truly,  and  returning  upon  the 
contemner)  of  these  bloated  minions  of  Dives.  They  would 
patronize  merit,  and  condescend  to  take  genius  by  the  hand. 
Contemptible  arrogance  !  ye  meanest  of  the  mean,  ignoble 
souls,  whose  highest  privilege  it  is  to  be  immortalized  to  pos 
terity  by  the  classic  scorn  of  the  indignant  human  creature 
you  would  protect ;  the  true  joys  of  the  scholar,  the  calm  life 
of  the  thinker,  the  grateful  occupations  of  the  author  are  un 
known  to  you.  Thriftless  men,  who  in  any  other  occupation 
would  have  succeeded  as  ill,  and  incapables,  who  should  as 
soon  have  attempted  shoemaking  as  authorship,  have  man 
aged  to  reflect  a  most  undeserved  odium  on  those  pursuits, 
which  adorn  wealth  and  elevate  poverty,  which  beautify 
science  and  invigorate  business.  Worthily  and  in  sincerity 
pursued,  what  occupation  is  so  full  of  utility,  as  well  as  of 
delight,  as  literature.  A  mode  of  life  that  leads  to  reflection 


THE    MORALITY    OF    POVERTY.  47 

and  self-denial ;  that  fosters  humanity  and  begets  an  enlarged 
curiosity  ;  that  inclines  equally  to  serious,  resolved  action,  and 
to  a  gay,  cheerful  temper ;  which  teaches  to  confine  our 
wants  and  limit  our  desires,  but  at  the  same  time  to  expand 
the  affections,  and  to  fortify  the  will ;  a  mode  of  life  that  con 
secrates  its  followers  as  a  select  body  of  liberal  spirits  ;  that 
unites  the  cultivation  of  the  highest  faculties  with  the  per 
formance  of  the  commonest  duties  ;  that  inspires  a  sense  of 
reverence  in  the  dullest  souls,  and  fascinates  the  roving  eye  of 
pleasure  ;  employments,  in  fine,  which  form  alone  the  worthi 
est  labors  of  the  wisest  and  best — these  constitute  the  occu 
pations  and  fill  the  hours  of  the  scholar. 

The  literary  life  is  never  so  happily  spent  as  in  a  condition 
of  moderate  competence  and  in  the  enjoyment  of  social  hap 
piness.  The  wealthiest  scholar,  even  if  a  man  of  genius,  is 
obliged,  from  the  nature  of  his  position,  and  to  avoid  the 
scandal  of  meanness,  or  the  odium  of  an  unsociable  dispo 
sition,  to  live  in  a  manner  abhorrent  to  his  tastes  and  literary 
habits.  He  must  live  splendidly,  when  he  would  prefer 
elegance  and  quiet ;  he  must  entertain  the  indifferent  and  the 
inquisitive,  where  he  had  rather  be  surrounded  by  the  chosen 
friends  of  his  youth.  In  a  word,  the  rich  scholar  must  live 
like  a  mere  rich  man,  and  is  in  danger  of  sinking  the  first 
character  in  the  second.  Wealth  has  obscured  genius  which 
would  have  been  drawn  out  by  exertion ;  at  least  as  often 
as  talent  has  been  obscured  by  misfortune. 

A  great  error,  though  a  very  frequent  one,  is,  that  utter 
solitude  and  celibacy  are  suited  to  the  man  of  letters.  That 
the  greatest  works  require  long  meditation  and  perfect  repose 
is  true.  No  less  true  is  it  that  the  periodical  critic  and  es 
sayist  must  pursue  his  labors  in  a  state  of  serenity  and  partial 
retirement.  The  true  literary  life  is  a  quiet  existence.  No 


CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

genuine  scholar  ever  yet  loved  a  crowd.  Yet  he  loves  so 
ciety  for  conversation,  and  masses  for  observation  of  manners. 
He  loves  chiefly  domestic  pleasures  ;  the  good  wife  has  often 
assisted,  and  never  yet  impeded,  the  occupations  of  her  hus 
band.  The  inmates  of  his  dwelling  learn  to  respect  his  hours 
of  solitude  and  study.  A  judicious  disposal  of  his  time  will 
leave  the  master  his  own  master,  and  the  experiences  of  do 
mesticity  will  prove  more  rich  and  abundant  than  the  know 
ledge  of  the  hackney  courtier  or  politician. 

Privacy  may  boast  of  its  heroes  and  heroism  that  a  public 
scene  cannot  display.  We  look  in  the  wrong  place  for  truly 
great  characters  ;  we  seek  them  in  high  stations,  but  seldom 
find  them  there.  Magnanimity,  like  eloquence,  is  often  found 
where  we  least  expect  it.  There  are  more  heroical  actions 
occurring  every  day  in  the  retirement  of  private  life  than  are 
to  be  seen  on  the  great  public  stage  of  the  world.  There  is 
more  of  fortitude  exhibited,  more  of  patience  in  suffering, 
more  true  benevolence,  a  nobler  charity,  a  wider  and  wiser 
generosity,  deeper  affection,  and  higher  aims  than  the  mind 
of  a  mere  worldling  can  conceive.  The  reason  is  plain.  The 
greatest  intellects  seek  repose  from  vain  struggles  of  ambition 
and  inefficient  plans  of  improvement.  The  gravest  business 
of  life,  rightly  viewed,  is  a  mere  farce,  and  those  pleasing 
labors  and  endearing  adversities,  that  make  up  a  private  life 
of  contented  trial  and  consequent  happiness,  are  in  fact  higher 
and  of  more  real  importance.  Domestic  life  is  the  only  field 
for  a  certain  class  of  virtues,  by  no  means  the  least  in  value. 
These  are  of  the  softer  and  milder  kind,  amiable  and  attrac 
tive.  Home  is  the  school  of  the  affections,  as  the  world  af 
fords  the  test  of  the  will  and  intellect.  In  that  embowered 
valley  bloom  the  sweet  flowers  of  heart's-ease  and  contented 


THE    MORALITY    OF    POVERTY.  49 

The  life  of  Wordsworth  might  be  proposed  as  a  model  to 
the  author  who  loves  letters  rather  than  a  literary  reputation, 
who  prefers  fame  to  fashion — not  only  to  the  poet  but  to  the 
humblest  prose  writer,  do  we  propose  it.  His  fine  maxim 
should  be  engraven  on  the  heart  of  every  true  student — 
"Plain  living,  and  high  thinking."  De  Quincy,  who  pub 
lished  his  recollections  of  the  lake  poets  some  years  since,  in 
Tait's  Magazine,  has  described  the  life  of  the  Miltonic  Bard, 
as  simple  to  frugality.  He  resided  in  a  small  cottage  with 
his  wife  and  sister  ;  his  guest  was  conducted  into  the  largest 
room  in  the  house,  smaller  than  an  ordinary  bed-room,  and 
which  had  another  occupant,  Wordsworth's  eldest  boy.  The 
common  sitting-room  was  half  parlor  and  half  kitchen.  The 
great  poet,  like  a  good  man,  a  lover  of  simple  pleasures,  de 
lighted  in  his  kettle's  "  faint  undersong."  His  library  was 
very  small  within  doors,  but  without,  what  immense  folios 
were  his  daily  reading — the  grand  mountain  scenery  of  his 
neighborhood.  Nature  is  Wordsworth's  library,  or  at  least 
wisest  commentator.  Were  he  never  so  rich  he  could  pos 
sess  no  pictures  like  the  landscape  around  him.  Even  his 
friend,  the  fine  painter,  Sir  George  Beaumont,  might  only 
copy  this  original.  And  for  company,  what  more  needed  he, 
to  whom  grand  thoughts  in  rich  abundance  came  flocking  at 
his  call ;  who  possessed  such  an  admirable  sister  and  so  ex 
cellent  a  wife.  Southey  was  but  a  few  hours'  journey  dis 
tant.  Coleridge  was  sometimes  his  guest.  There  too  came 
Hazlitt  and  Charles  Lamb,  and  there  ever  abided  guardian 
angels  of  the  poet,  the  spirits  of  humanity  and  philosophy,  in 
strict  alliance  with  the  Genius  of  Poesy  ! 

None  but  a  poor-spirited  fool  ever  esteemed  a  man  the  less 
for  his  poverty,  and  pity,  in  such  cases,  is  insult.  The  com 
passion  is  a  glozing  apology  for  the  indulgence  of  purse  pride, 


50  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

the  meanest  form  of  Satan's  favorite  sin,  and  which  he  must 
heartily  despise.  He  who  devotes  a  life  to  letters  cannot  ex 
pect  wealth  :  competency  is  the  most  he  can  look  for,  a 
thorough  education,  in  it  widest  sense,  for  his  children,  and  a 
comfortable,  though  confined  maintenance  for  those  dearest 
to  him  and  least  fitted  to  struggle  with  misfortune.  A  fail- 
example  and  an  honorable  fame  is  a  richer  legacy  than  a 
large  fortune  without  either.  Most  fortunate  he  who  can 
unite  all.  But  the  spirit  of  study  is  adverse  to  the  spirit  of 
accumulation.  A  man  with  one  idea,  and  that  of  money- 
making,  can  hardly  fail,  from  one  dollar,  of  realizing  a  million. 
But  a  man  of  many  ideas,  of  a  comprehensive  spirit,  and  of 
aspiring  views,  can  never  contract  his  manly  mind  to  the  cir 
cumference  of  a  store  or  factory.  In  his  fixed  and  awful  gaze 
at  the  wonders  of  creation,  or  in  his  rapt  ecstasy  at  the  celes 
tial  harmony  of  poesy,  opportunities  of  profit  will  slip  by, 
the  golden  moments  of  barter  escape.  His  purse  is  lighter, 
it  must  be  confessed  ;  but  he  has  gained  a  richer  accession  of 
fancies  and  feelings  than  the  world  can  give  or  take  away. 


VIII. 

CHAPTER    ON    SOME    OLD    AND    LATER    ENGLISH    SONNETS. 

THE   sonnet   is  of  Italian  origin,   and    was   imported   into 
England  from  that  country  by  the  Earl  of  Surrey, 

"  that  renowned  lord, 

Th' old  English  glory  bravely  that  restor'd,     • 
That  prince  and  poet  (a  name  more  divine)," 


OLD    AND    LATER    ENGLISH    SONNETS.  51 

as  Drayton  enthusiastically  writes.  Originally  a  pupil  of 
Petrarch,  he  left  the  metaphysical  style  of  his  master  for  a 
more  gallant  and  courtly  manner.  He  was  "the  bright  par 
ticular  star"  of  the  court  of  Henry  VIII.,  as  Sidney  was  of 
that  of  Elizabeth,  and  resembled  his  famous  successor  in 
that  dangerous  post  of  favorite  in  more  than  one  trait  of  his 
character.  Like  him,  he  was  an  accomplished  gentleman,  a 
graceful  poet,  an  elegant  scholar,  and  a  gallant  knight.  Like 
him,  he  chanted  soft,  amorous  lays  to  his  chosen  fair,  and  has 
immortalized  the  source  of  his  inspiration  in  strains  of  melt 
ing  beauty.  Surrey  is  the  first  classic  English  poet  (we  place 
Chaucer  at  the  head  of  the  romantic  school,  before  the  era 
of  Spenser  and  Shakspeare) ;  and  he  was  the  first  writer  of 
English  sonnets.  He  is  said  to  have  been  the  introducer  of 
blank  verso  into  our  poetry.  For  these  two  gifts  to  our 
literature,  if  for  none  others,  we  should  hold  his  reputation 
in  honorable  remembrance.  We  recollect  no  one  sonnet  of 
surpassing  beauty  (Mrs.  Jameson,  in  her  Loves  of  the  Poets, 
has  culled  the  finest  lines) :  they  will  bear  no  comparison 
with  succeeding  pieces  in  the  same  department.  And  as  we 
wish  to  secure  space  for  certain  fine  specimens  of  Sidney, 
Shakspeare,  Drummond,  and  Milton,  we  must  not  encumber 
our  page  with  any  but  the  choicest  productions  of  the  Muse. 
We  pass,  then,  to  the  all  accomplished  Sidney.  His  son 
nets  are  chiefly  "  vain  and  amatorious,"  yet  full  of  "  wit  and 
worth."  We  agree  heartily  in  Lamb's  admiration  for  them, 
as  well  as  for  their  admirable  author,  deprecating  entirely  the 
carping  and  illiberal  spirit  in  which  Ilazlitt  criticised  them. 
The  acutest  and  most  eloquent  English  critic  of  this  century 
was  sometimes  prejudiced  and  occasionally  partial.  \Ve  find 
him  so  here.  For  delicacy,  fancy,  and  purity  of  feeling, 
Sidney  is  the  finest  of  English  writers  of  the  sonnet.  He  is 


52  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

certainly  less  weighty  and  grand  than  Milton,  less  pathetic 
than  Drummond,  far  less  copious  and  rich  than  Wordsworth, 
yet  in  the  graceful  union  of  the  Poet  and  Lover  surpassing 
all.  He  is  here,  as  in  his  life -and  actions,  the  Knight  "sans 
peur  et  sans  reproche."  Stella,  the  goddess  of  his  idolatry, 
was  at  once  his  mistress  and  his  muse ;  anciently,  a  very 
frequent  combination  of  characters.  We  know  not,  but 
believe  the  sonnets  of  Sidney  are  little  known.  This,  and 
the  intrinsic  beauty  of  the  poem,  must  serve  to  excuse  us  for 
the  following  extract : 

Because  I  oft  in  dark  abstracted  guise 
Seem  most  alone  in  greatest  company, 
With  dearth  of  words,  or  answer  quite  awry 
To  them  that  would  make  speech  of  speech  arise, 
They  deem,  and  of  their  doom  the  rumor  flies, 
That  poison  foul  of  bubbling  Pride  doth  lie 
So  in  my  swelling  breast,  that  only  I 
Fawn  on  myself,  and  others  do  despise. 
For  Pride  1  think  doth  not  my  soul  possess, 
Which  looks  too  oft  in  his  unflattering  glass  ; 
But  one  worse  fault,  Ambition,  I  confess, 
That  makes  me  oft  my  best  friends  overpass, 
Unseen,  unheard,  while  thought  to  highest  place, 
Bends  all  his  powers,  even  unto  Stella's  grace. 

In  a  further  beautiful  sonnet  occurs  this  fanciful  apostrophe 
to  Sleep : 

Come,  Sleep,  0  Sleep,  the  certain  knot  of  peace, 
The  baiting- place  of  wit,  the  balm  of  woe, 
The  poor  man's  wealth,  the  prisoner's  release, 
The  indifferent  judge  between  the  high  and  low. 


OLD    AND    LATER    ENGLISH    SONNETS.  53 

This  reminds  us  strongly  of  Shakspeare's  famous  exclama 
tion  of  Macbeth,  bent  on  his  murderous  errand : 

the  innocent  sleep ; 


Sleep,  that  knits  up  the  ravell'd  sleeve  of  care, 
The  death  of  each  day's  life,  sore  labor's  bath, 
Balm  of  hurt  minds,  great  Nature's  second  course, 
Chief  Xourisher  in  life's  feast. 

The  sonnets  of  Sidney  are  highly  characteristic.  They 
combine  contemplation  and  knightly  grace.  They  were 
written  in  the  heyday  of  his  blood  (he  died  at  the  age  of 
thirty-four)  :  and  cannot  be  fairly  compared  with  the  later 
productions  of  a  greater  and  more  mature  genius.  Sidney,  it 
must  not  be  forgotten,  was  a  courtier  and  chivalrous  soldier, 
no  less  than  the  admired  poet  of  his  time,  and  we  should 
allow  accordingly  in  our  estimate  of  his  poetry.  lie  filled  a 
brief  career  with  monuments  of  literary  glory  and  military 
honor :  he  endeared  himself  to  a  nation  by  his  graces  and 
worth,  and  drew  friends  and  followers  to  his  heart,  by  its 
sincerity  and  virtues.  He  died  "with  his  martial  cloak  about 
him,"  and  full  of  fame.  It  was  reckoned  an  honor  to  have 
been  his  friend.  History  records  not  his  enemy. 

The  little  we  know  of  Shakspeare  is  to  be  learnt  from  a 
perusal  of  his  sonnets,  which  afford  a  glimpse  of  poetical  au 
tobiography.  The  main  particulars  are  his  devoted  gratitude 
to  his  noble  patron,  the  generous  Earl  of  Southampton,  and 
his  romantic  attachment  to  a  "  fair  peraonne,"  who  is  supposed 
to  have  been  a  beautiful  specimen  of  an  unfortunate  class  of 
females.  Our  "  myriad-minded"  bard,  far  above  the  general 
order  of  humanity,  as  he  was,  from  his  vast  intellectual  su 
periority,  was  yet  a  very  man  (and  for  that  we  love  him  all 
the  better)  in  his  affections  and  passions,  like  to  one  of  us. 


54  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

The  most  profound  of  philosophers,  the  noblest  of  humorists, 
the  grandest  painter  of  the  passions,  was  a  lover  and  gallant 
gentleman.  Perhaps  his  constancy  was  unable  to  stand  the 
test  of  temptation  upon  all  occasions  (but  that  we  may  allow 
to  a  roving  and  excited  youth)  :  though  after  middle  life  we 
hear  of  his  quiet  life  as  a  landholder  and  paterfamilias. 
Doubtless  "  the  reaming  swaats  that  drank  divinely"  at  the 
Mermaid,  and  his  lively  associates  at  the  Globe  Theatre,  were 
sometimes  too  much  for  any  prudential  plan  of  life.  But  in 
those  scenes  the  great  teacher  learnt  many  an  instructive  les 
son,  which  he  has  taught  us  ;  nor  shall  we  dare  to  arraign 
the  venial  follies  of  the  selectest  spirit  of  our  race.  We  find 
numerous  single  lines  and  couplets  in  some  of  these  sonnets 
that  develope  the  character  of  their  author  more  fully  than 
any  labored  biographical  or  critical  commentary.  He  gives 
us  pictures  of  his  own  feelings,  his  desiring  "  this  man's  art 
and  that  man's  scope :"  he  apologizes  for  his  profession  as  an 
actor,  insinuating  that  it  degrades  him  not  (as  it  never  should 
degrade  any,  but  as  it  too  often  tends  to  degradation).  He 
fairly  speaks  out  a  lofty  self-estimate,  none  the  less  true  for 
its  candour : 

K"ot  marble,  nor  the  gilded  monuments 
Of  princes  shall  outlive  this  powerful  rhyme ; 
But  you  shall  shine  more  bright  in  these  contents 
Than  unwept  stone,  besmear'd  with  sluttish  time. 
When  wasteful  war  shall  statues  overturn, 
And  broils  root  out  the  work  of  masonry, 
Nor  Mars's  sword,  nor  war's  quick  fire  shall  burn 
The  living  record  of  your  memory. 

The  vulgar  error  of  Shakspeare's  reserve  must  have  arisen 
with  those  who  never  saw  his  miscellaneous  poems.     It  is 


OLD    AND    LATER    ENGLISH    SONNETS.  55 

true  amid  the  varied  characters  that  stud  his  dramatic  page, 
it  is  impossible  to  fasten  any  upon  him,  who  painted  them 
all.  But  we  find  self-confession  enough  in  the  sonnets,  and 
we  are  much  surprised  at  the  nature  of  it,  so  much  of  melan 
choly  and  repining,  utterly  unlike  our  idea  of  the  robust  ge 
nius  and  vigorous  heart  of  the  creator  of  Falstaffand  of 
Lear. 

Shakspeare's  best  sonnets,  and  indeed  nearly  all  of  them, 
are  devoted  to  the  expression  of  an  apparently  hopeless  pas 
sion.  They  form  a  love  history,  mysterious  and  obscure, 
which  we  shall  not  attempt  to  penetrate.  It  is  enough  to 
add,  that  (which  might  be  premised  as  impossible)  they  do 
not  raise  Shakspeare  to  a  higher  rank  than  he  before  at 
tained  :  that  perhaps  we  idolize  his  fame  less  where  we  were 
admitted  (too  freely)  into  certain  secrets  of  his  personal  his 
tory,  and  it  must  also  be  confessed  that  he  has  dallied  with 
the  muse  in  these  offerings  at  her  shrine,  rather  than  put  forth 
his  Samson  strength  in  lofty  triumph. 

On  no  one  occasion  does  he  attempt  to  reach  a  higher  pitch 
than  was  attained  by  the  general  attempts  in  the  same  form 
of  poetry.  It  is  true  even  the  lightest  trifles  are  impressed 
with  a  nameless  spirit  from  his  exuberant  genius  and  subtle 
individuality.  It  is  true  his  phrases,  his  expressive  language, 
are  eminently  Shakesperean.  Yet  are  they  comparatively 
wasted  on  trivial  themes,  or  levelled  to  a  moderate  key-note 
of  passion.  They  contain  none  of  the  deep  contemplativencss 
of  Wordsworth,  or  the  spirited  yet  condensed  power  of  Milton. 
We  speak  thus  of  these  productions  in  comparison  with  simi 
lar  attempts  of  other  great  poets ;  and  more  especially  in 
comparison  with  the  other  works  of  Shakspeare — his  dramas, 
the  richest  legacy  ever  bequeathed  to  mankind  by  a  single 
individual.  For  any  other  bard,  it,  would  be  praise  enough 


56  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

to  have  equalled  the  least  valuable  works  of  Shakspeare.  and 
these  sonnets  would  have  made  the  reputation  of  almost  any 
one  else.  The  two  finest  occur  in  one  of  his  plays  ;*  that  on 
Study,  beginning,  "  Study  is  like  heaven's  glorious  sun,"  and 
that  more  tender  passage  of  self-expostulation  and  apology, 
for  which  we  must  make  room  : 

Did  not  the  heavenly  rhetoric  of  thine  eye, 
'Gainst  whom  the  world  cannot  hold  argument, 
Persuade  my  heart  to  tbis  false  perjury  ? 
Vows  for  thee  broke,  deserve  not  punishment. 
A  woman  I  forswore  ;  but  I -will  prove, 
Thou  being  a  goddess,  I  forswore  not  thee : 
My  vow  was  earthly,  thou  a  heavenly  love  ; 
Thy  grace  being  gain'd,  cures  all  disgrace  in  me. 
My  vow  was  breath,  and  breath  a  vapor  is  ; 
Then  thou,  fair  sun,  which  on  my  earth  dost  shine, 
Exhal'st  this  vapor  vow  ;  in  thee  it  is  : 
If  broken,  then  it  is  no  fault  of  mine. 
If  by  me  broke,  what  fool  is  not  so  wise 
To  break  an  oath,  to  win  a  Paradise  ? 

His  picture  of  his  mistress  forms  a  fair  pendant  to  the 
above,  and  shonld  not  therefore  be  omitted : 

Fair  is  my  love,  but  not  as  fair  as  fickle  ; 
Mild  as  a  dove,  but  neither  true  nor  trusty  ; 
Brighter  than  glass,  and  yet,  as  glass  is,  brittle  ; 
Softer  than  wax,  and  yet,  as  iron,  rusty  ; 
A  little  pale,  with  damask  dye  to  grace  her  ; 
None  fairer,  nor  one  falser  to  deface  her. 
Her  lips  to  mine  how  often  hath  she  joined, 
Between  each  kiss  her  oaths  of  true  love  swearing  I 
How  many  tales  to  please  me  hath  she  coin'd. 

*  Love's  Labor  Lost. 


OLD    AND    LATER    ENGLISH    SONNETS.  57 

Dreading  my  love,  the  loss  whereof  still  fearing  ! 

Yet  in  the  midst  of  till  her  pure  pretestings, 

Her  faith,  her  oaths,  her  tears,  and  all,  were  jestings. 

She  burnt  with  love,  as  straw  with  flre  flameth, 

She  burnt  with  love,  as  soon  as  straw  outburneth  ; 

She  fram'd  the  love,  and  yet  she  foil'd  the  framing. 

She  bade  love  last,  and  yet  she  fell  a  turning. 

Was  this  a  lover,  or  a  lecher  whether  1 

Bad  in  the  best,  though  excellent  in  neither.* 

Passing  over  the  slight  effusions  of  forgotten  versifiers,  our 
list  brings  us  next  to  Drummond  of  Hawthornden,  the  best 
representative  of  the  Scottish  inuse  before  Allan  Ramsay's 
time,  and  the  friend  of  Ben  Jonson.  The  record  of  their 
famous  conversations  has  been  made  public  of  late  years 
through  the  researches  of  one  of  the  Antiquarian  Societies. 
Like  all  of  the  early  sonneteers,  who  copied  their  master  Pe 
trarch  in  this,  as  in  other  respects,  Drummond  had  his  tni.s- 
tress  for  a  rnuse — but  the  specimen  we  shall  present  of  his 
sonnets  is  one  of  a  more  general  description.  It  is  addressed 
to  Sleep,  and  discovers  a  close  resemblance  to  the  verses  of 
Sidney  and  Shakspeare,  before  quoted  : 

Sleep,  silence'  child,  sweet  father  of  soft  rest, 
Prince  whose  approach  peace  to  all  mortals  brings, 
Indifferent  host  to  shepherds  and  to  kings, 
Sole  comforter  of  minds  which  are  opprest ; 
Lo  by  thy  charming  rod  all  breathing  things 
Lie  slumb'ring  with  forgetfulness  possest, 
And  yet  oe'r  me  to  spread  thy  drowsy  wings 
Thou  sparest  (alas !)  who  cannot  be  thy  guest. 
Since  I  am  thine,  O  come,  but  with  that  face 
To  inward  light  which  thou  were  wont  to  show, 

*  A  somewhat  similar  history  is  to  be  read  in  the  "  Modern  Pvg- 
malion"  of  a  late  brilliant  oritic  and  metaphysician. 
3* 


58  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

With  fancied  solace  ease  a  true-felt  woe  ; 
Or  if,  deaf  god,  thou  do  deny  that  grace, 

Come  as  thou  wilt,  and  what  thou  wilt  bequeath : 

I  long  to  kiss  the  image  of  my  death.} 

This  poet  is  distinguished  for  a  sweet  and  elegant  pathetic 
vein  ;  his  line  is  "  most  musical,  most  melancholy."  He 
writes  thus  of  his  prevalent  manner,  in  a  sonnet  on  his 
Lute : 

What  art  thou  but  a  harbinger  of  woe  ? 

Thy  pleasing  notes  be  pleasing  notes  no  more, 

But  orphan's  wailings  to  the  fainting  ear, 

Each  stroke  a  sigh,  eacli  sound  draws  forth  a  tear, 

For  which  be  silent  as  in  words  before: 
Or  if  that  any  hand  to  touch  thee  deign, 
Like  widow'd  turtle  still  her  loss  complain. 

For  this  lugubrious  coloring  he  accounts  by  the  absence 
of  "  that  dear  voice,"  which  did  thy  sounds  approve : 

W  hich  wont  in  such  harmonious  strains  to  flow, 
Is  reft  from  earth  to  tune  those  spheres  above. 

Milton  is  the  last  great  name  of  the  elder  bards  we  shall 
presume  to  invoke.  He  is  the  second  sonnet  writer  in  Eng 
lish  ;  we  place  Wordsworth  at  the  head.  Some  half  dozen 
of  Milton's  [he  wrote  altogether  only  fourteen,  we  believe] 
are  unequalled.  But  though  our  great  living  poet  rarely 
rises  as  high  as  Milton,  yet  his  copiousness  and  unmatched 
volubility  of  expression  combine  to  give  him  the  precedence. 
Shakspeare  we  place  out  of  comparison,  since  he  attempted 
no  sonnets  of  the  reflective  kind.  Few  of  Wordsworth's 
bear  any  mention  of  love,  and  where  they  do  speak  of  it,  it  is 


OLD    AND    LATER    ENGLISH    SONNETS.  59 

a  holy  thing,  not  the  libertine  passion  of  courtly  versifiers. 
Milton's  grandest  sonnets,  each  of  them  a  small  epic  in  itself, 
have  been  sufficiently  noticed  ;  but  there  is  one  less  referred 
to,  that  we  think  deserves  the  more  regard,  from  its  personal 
nature,  referring  to  himself  with  a  certain  sublime  self- 
consideration  and  Grecian  enthusiasm,  that  bespeak  the 
builder  of  the  loftiest  of  epics. 

When  the  assault  was  intended  on  the  city — 

Captain,  or  colonel,  or  knight  in  arms, 

"Whose  chance  on  these  defenceless  doors  may  seize, 

If  deed  of  honor  did  thee  ever  please, 

Guard  them,  and  him  within  protect  from  harms. 

He  can  requite  thee;  for  he  knows  the  charms 

That  eall  fame  on  such  gentle  acts  as  these, 

And  he  can  spread  thy  name  o'er  lands  and  seas, 

Whatever  clime  the  sun's  bright  circle  wanna. 

Lift  not  thy  spear  against  the  Muse's  bower ; 

The  great  Emathian  conqueror  bid  spare 

The  house  of  Pindarus,  when  temple  and  tower 

Went  to  the  ground;   and  the  repeated  air 

Of  sad  Electra's  Poet  ha  1  the  power 

To  save  the  Athenian  walls  from  ruin  bare. 

The  sonnet  is,  perhaps,  the  most  aitificial  form  of  poetry, 
and,  in  consequence,  the  most  difficult  to  execute  with  spirit- 
The  chief  difficulty  appears  to  lie  in  preserving  the  unity  and 
integrity  of  the  single  thought  or  sentiment  which  it  is  in 
tended  to  express  and  convey.  It  is  essential  that  the  idea 
be  not  departed  from,  though  various  shades  of  meaning  may 
be  introduced  with  effect.  It  is  no  less  important  that  the 
idea  be  completely  filled  out;  a  meagre  «ketch  being  equally 
faulty  with  a  superfluous  abundance  of  thoughts.  The  re 
striction  to  just  fourteen  lines  is  an  obstacle  of  itself  to  the 


60  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

prosecution  of  a  genial  poetic  design.  Rapt  in  his  visions  of 
beauty,  the  poet  must  still  not  stray  beyond  this  fixed  limit, 
which  appears  arbitrary  enough.  Yet  these  very  restrictions 
tend  to  compactness  and  symmetrical  beauty.  To  a  culti 
vated  ear,  the  music  of  a  fine  sonnet  is  not  the  least  pleasing 
adjunct  to  this  form  of  verse ;  nor  should  we  overlook  the 
advantage  gained  to  the  thought  itself  by  such  an  harmonious . 
yet  concise  utterance  of  it. 

Like  those  minor  forms  of  prose  writing,  the  letter  and 
the  essay,  the  sonnet  is  happy  in  an  unlimited  range  of  sub 
ject  and  variety  of  style,  of  martial  or  sentimental,  amorous, 
philosophic,  familiar  and  pathetic.  It  is  a  miniature  ode, 
with  less  of  variety  and  more  formal  design  ;  but  it  enjoys  in 
common  with  the  ode,  the  characteristic  of  a  susceptibility  of 
conveying  strong  personal  traits,  and  of  rendering  itself  in 
stinct  with  the  most  individual  subtleties  of  personal  charac 
ter.  But  why  do  we  enlarge  upon  this  therne,  when  we  have 
the  noble  sonnet  of  Wordsworth  at  hand,  at  once  the  highest 
defence  and  purest  eulogiuni  upon  sonnets  and  the  writers  of 
them? 

Scorn  not  the  Sonnet ;  Critic,  you  have  frowned, 

Mindless  of  its  just  honors;  with  this  key 

Shakspeare  unlocked  his  heart;  the  melody 

Of  this  small  lute  gave  ease  to  Petrarch's  wound; 

A  thousand  times  this  pipe  did  Tasso  sound  ; 

Camoens  soothed  with  it  an  exile's  grief; 

The  Sonnet  glittered  a  gay  myrtle  leaf 

Amid  the  cypress  with  which  Dante  crowned 

His  visionary  brow  ;  a  glow-worm  lamp. 

It  cheered  mild  Spenser,  called  from  Faery-land 

To  struggle  through  dark  ways ;  and  when  a  damp 

Fell  round  the  path  of  Milton,  in  his  hand 

The  thing  became  a  trumpet,  whence  he  blew 

Soul  animating  strains— alas,  too  few  ! 


OLD    AND    LATER    ENGLISH    SONNETS.  61 

Since  the  time  of  Milton,  sonnet-writing  has  been  little  in 
vogue,  until  the  commencement  of  the  present  century.  The 
wits  of  Charles's  days  were  too  much  occupied  with  libertine 
songs  or  political  epigrams,  to  pen  thoughtful  and  elaborate 
poetry.  The  wits  of  Queen  Anne  were  too  courtly  and  arti 
ficial  to  relish  musings  on  nature,  or  philosophical  meditations, 
or  amorous  conceits,  after  the  old  fashion.  And  though  it 
may  seem  paradoxical  to  remark  it,  the  sonnet  was  too  artifi 
cial  a  form  of  writing  even  for  the  most  artificial  of  English 
Poets,  Dry  den  and  Pope.  But  its  art  evinced  higher  prin 
ciples  of  harmony  than  the  polished  couplet  required.  We 
do  not  recollect  a  single  sonnet  of  the  first,  or  even  second 
class  of  excellence,  from  Milton  to  Thomas  Warton.  Butler, 
Rochester,  Denham,  Waller,  Roscommon,  wrote  none :  neither 
did  any  of  the  religious  poets  of  that  ngc,  Quarles,  Herbert, 
Donne,  or  Crashaw.  Cowley,  in  his  fine-spun  reveries,  comes 
nearest  to  the  matter  of  the  best  sonnet  writers,  but  his  man 
ner  is  different.  If  we  come  to  the  next  epoch  of  English 
verse,  we  find  not  a  single  sonnet  in  the  writings  of  Dryden, 
Pope,  Swift,  Gay,  Addison,  Steele,  &c.  It  is  only  in  a 
thoughtful  and  tasteful  character,  by  a  lover  of  meditative 
leisure,  an  admirer  oi  nature,  that  the  sonnet  is  ever  likely  to 
be  cultivated.  It  presents  no  brilliant  points  for  the  man  of 
wit ;  it  is  tedious  and  diffuse  for  the  gay  man  of  lively  talent. 
It  is  a  form  of  poetry  that  would  never  strike  the  lovers  of 
satire  or  pictures  of  artificial  manners  agreeably  ;  unless,  as 
the  pastoral  struck  the  Queen  Anne  poets,  as  a  subject  tor 
burlesque.  A  true  reader  of  the  sonnet  loves  not  the  glare 
of  what  passes  for  strong  lines,  brilliant  passages.  This  may 
be  readily  seen  in  the  difference  of  taste,  and  in  conception  of 
the  poetical  character,  that  distinguishes  the  followers  of 
Wordsworth  and  of  Byron. 


62  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

Before  the  time  of  the  Lake  Poets  and  their  followers,  both 
together,  including  the  finest  poets  this  century  has  produced, 
Wordsworth,  Coleridge,  Keats,  Lamb,  and  Leigh  Hunt,  we 
can  point  but  to  one  true  poet  who  wrote  good  sonnets,  al 
most  worthy  of  Drummond — Thomas  Warton.  Warton  was 
a  man  of  elegant  fancy  and  fine  sensibility,  but  without  any 
vigorous  imagination  or  peculiar  individuality.  Yet  Hazlitt, 
much  to  the  surprise  of  his  readers,  says,  that  he  cannot  help 
preferring  his  sonnets  to  any  in  the  language.  Now,  paralleled 
by  Milton  or  Wordsworth,  Warton  is  feeble ;  though  he  is 
forcible  in  comparison  with  Bowles.  We  annex  his  very  best 
sonnet,  as  it  reads  to  us  ;  so  much  superior  to  the  remainder, 
that  it  appears  to  have  been  the  work  of  another  hand. 

Written  in  a  blank-leaf  of  Dug  dale's  Monasticon. 

Deem  not  devoid  of  elegance,  the  sage, 

By  fancy's  genuine  feelings  unbeguil'd 

Of  painful  pedantry  the  poring  child, 

Who  turns,  of  these  proud  domes,  th'  historic  page, 

Now  sunk  by  time  and  Henry's  fiercer  rage. 

Think'st  thou  the  warbling  muses  never  smil'd 

On  his  lone  hours  ?     Ingenuous  views  engage 

His  thoughts,  on  themes,  unclassic  falsely  sty  I'd, 

Intent.     While  cloister'd  piety  displays 

Her  mouldering  roll,  the  piercing  eye  explores 

New  manners,  and  the  pomp  of  elder  days, 

Whence  culls  the  pensive  bard  his  picturd  stores. 

Nor  rough,  nor  barren  are  the  winding  ways 

Of  hoar  antiquity,  but  strewn  with  flowers. 

During  what  may  be  called  the  Hayley  rage,  when  the 
author  of  the  Triumphs  of  Temper  was  esteemed  a  great  poet 
(so  barren  was  the  vineyard  of  genial  laborers),  a  band  of 
sonneteers  arose,  who  have  deservedly  been  forgotten.  For 


OLD    AND    LATER    ENGLISH    SONNETS.  63 

of  all  imbecilities,  to  use  a  Carlyleism,  that  of  writing  weak 
poetry  is  at  once  the  most  pitiable  and  the  most  reprehensi 
ble.  The  poetic  offspring,  worthily  begotten,  thrives  even 
amidst  the  bleak  freezings  of  Neglect :  but  a  puny  poem,  like 
a  puny  child,  rarely  lives  long,  and  only  usurps  the  place  of 
something  better.  We  may  speak  thus,  at  the  present  time, 
of  the  attempts  of  Miss  Seward  and  Charlotte  Smith,  since 
we  have  been  treated  to  more  delicate  cates  and  fed  on  heav 
enly  food.  Later  still  and  nearer  to  our  own  time,  we  have 
instances  of  men  of  poetic  taste,  though  utterly  devoid  of  all 
poetic  genius,  who  have  failed  signally  in  the  sonnet,  and 
who  are  only  known  from  their  general  connection  with  liter 
ature.  The  Rev.  W.  Lisle  Bowles  is  better  known  from  Cole 
ridge's  early  admiration  of  his  sonnets,  and  from  his  stake  in 
the  Pope  controversy,  than  from  any  one  other  reason.  In 
the  latter  he  failed  to  gain  his  cause,  though  on  the  right 
side.  Coleridge  is  said  to  have  transcribed  his  sonnets  forty 
times  in  the  course  of  eighteen  months  in  order  to  make 
presents  of  them  to  his  school-fellows ;  we  can  only  account 
for  it  by  the  fact,  that  many  inferior  authors  have  sometimes 
been  more  suggestive  than  their  masters,  and  it  may  have 
been  a  mere  vagary  of  a  boy  of  genius.  Coleridge's  own 
sonnet,  addressed  to  Bowles,  is  richly  worth  the  whole  of 
Bowles's  sonnets  put  together.  George  Dyer,  the  friend  of 
Lamb  the  antiquary  (whose  character  Lamb  has  so  admirably 
depicted,)  the  historian  of  Cambridge,  the  scholar  and  gentle 
companion,  will  be  known  to  posterity  solely  through  the 
medium  of  his  friend's  original  humor  and  delicious  irony, 
which  he  so  widely  mistook.  Leigli  Hunt,  though  a  grace 
ful  narrator,  a  charming  essayist,  and  a  lively  critic;  a  friend 
of  poets,  and  in  other  walks,  a  pleasing  poet  himself,  has  yet 
been  unable  to  do  justice  to  his  tine  genius  in  the  sonnet. 


04  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

His  friend,  Charles  Lamb,  too,  has  done  his  best  things  in 
prose.  But  among  the  few  sonnets  left  by  the  inimitable 
Elia,  occur  three  perfect  specimens — that  on  Cambridge,  and 
those  on  Work,  and  Leisure. 

Lamb's  latest  publisher,  Moxon,  has  written  some  very 
tolerable  sonnets — for  a  bookseller ;  though  they  are  tainted 
with  the  general  defect  of  feebleness.  The  Hon.  R.  Monck- 
ton  Milnes,  the  parliamentary  poet,  may  be  ranked  in  the 
same  category.  Wordsworth,  Coleridge,  and  Keats,  are  the 
writers  of  the  genuine  sonnet,  in  this  nineteenth  century,  and 
by  far  the  best  poets.  The  majestic  tone  and  deep  feeling 
of  the  first,  the  learned  invention  and  universality  of  talent  of 
the  second,  and  the  exuberant  fancy  of  the  third,  can  fitly  be 
measured  by  none  but  the  same  standards  that  we  apply  to 
the  old  Elizabethan  poets  and  to  Milton. 

Wordsworth  is  now  confessedly  the  finest  sonnet  writer  in 
the  world,  equalling  in  many  sonnets,  even  the  majesty,  the 
tenderness  and  Attic  grace  of  Milton  in  a  few.  Wordsworth's 
copiousness  is  remarkable,  and  at  the  same  time  his  richness 
of  thought  and  expression.  A  mechanical  writer  might  turn 
out  sonnets  by  the  dozen,  but  of  what  value,  we  would  in 
quire.  Wordsworth's  are  admirable,  perfectly  appropriate, 
and  harmonious  as  the  breathings  of  Apollo's  flute.  Occa 
sionally,  he  blows  a  noble  blast,  as  from  a  silver  trumpet  of 
surpassing  power  ;  but  his  favorite  style  may  be  likened  to 
the  music  of  a  chamber-organ,  though  he  can  also  make  the 
massive  pealing  organ  of  the  cathedral  blow.  His  range  is 
universal ;  moral,  patriotic,  tender,  domestic.  He  is  medita 
tive,  playful,  familiar.  We  should  be  ashamed  to  quote 
specimens  of  Wordsworth,  were  he  not  really  still  a  poet  un 
known  to  the  mass,  even  of  educated  readers.  There  are  ten 
copies  of  Byron,  Moore,  or  Scott,  sold  (at  least)  to  one  of 
Wordsworth,  who  is  worth  all  three. 


OLD    AND    LATER    ENGLISH    SONNETS.  C5 

Of  the  different  series,  we  prefer  the  Miscellaneous  Sonnets, 
and  next  to  them,  the  sonnet  dedicated  to  Liberty ;  the 
Ecclesiastical  sonnets  are  less  interesting  to  the  general  reader, 
and  written  with  less  power,  but  they  add  a  new  and  pecu 
liar  grace  to  the  history  of  the  British  Church,  and  ought  to 
be  enshrined  in  the  hearts  of  its  members. 

The  following  should  form  the  guiding  maxims  of  the 
patriot,  and  evince  a  noble  sympathy  with  political  liberty 
and  individual  greatness  : 

XIV. 

Milton  !  thou  should'st  be  living  at  tin's  hour ; 

England  hath  need  of  thee ;  she  is  a  ten 

Of  stngnant  waters;  altar,  sword  and  pen, 

Fireside,  the  heroic  wreath  of  hall  and  bower, 

Have  forfeited  their  ancient  English  dower, 

Of  inward  happiness.     "We  are  selfish  men  ; 

Oh  !  raise  us  up,  return  to  us  again  ; 

And  give  us  manners,  virtue,  freedom,  power. 

T/iy  soul  was  like  a  star,  and  dwelt  apart : 

Thou  hadst  a  voice  whose  sound  was  like  the  sea, 

Pure  as  the  naked  heavens,  majestic,  free. 

So  didst  thou  travel  on  life's  common  way, 

In  cheerful  godliness ;  and  yet  thy  heart 

The  lowliest  duties  on  herself  did  lay. 

xv. 

Great  men  have  been  among  us  :  hands  that  penned 
And  tongues  that  uttered  wisdom  better  none  : 
The  later  Sidney,  Marvel,  Harrington, 
Young  Vane,  and  others  who  called  Milton  friend. 
These  moralists  could  act  and  comprehend  : 
They  knew  how  genuine  glory  was  put  on  ; 
Taught  us  how  rightfully  a  nation  shone 
In  splend<  r;  what  strength  was,  that  would  not  bend 


66  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS, 

But  in  magnanimous  meekness.     France,  'tis  strange 
Has  brought  forth  no  such  souls  as  we  had  then. 
Perpetual  emptiness  !  unceasing  change  ! 
No  single  volume  paramount,  no  code, 
No  master  spirit,  no  determined  road  ; 
But  equally  a  want  of  books  and  men  ! 

Of  the  Miscellaneous  Sonnets,  two-thirds  of  which  are  pure 
gold,  we  quote  only  the  beautiful  bonnet  on  the  departure  of 
Sir  Walter  Scott  from  Abbotsford,  for  Naples  : 

A  trouble,  not  of  clouds,  or  weeping  rain, 

Nor  of  the  setting  Sun's  pathetic  light 

Engender'd,  hangs  o'er  Eildon's  triple  height. 

Spirits  of  power,  assembled  there,  complain 

For  kindred  power  departing  from  their  sight ; 

"While  Tweed,  best  pleased  in  chanting  a  blithe  strain, 

Saddens  his  voice  again,  and  yet  again. 

Lift  up  your  hearts,  ye  mourners  !  for  the  might 

Of  the  whole  world's  good  wishes  with  him  goes : 

Blessings  and  prayers  in  nobler  retinue 

Than  sceptred  king  or  laurelled  conqueror  knows, 

Follow  this  wondrous  potentate.     Be  true, 

Ye  winds  of  ocean  and  the  midland  sea, 

Wafting  your  charge  to  soft  Parthenope! 

Coleridge  wrote  but  few  sonnets,  but  they  are  among  the 
most  admirable  of  the  fragments  of  his  poetic  genius.  Most 
of  them  are  political,  celebrating  some  one  of  his  favorite 
heroes,  Burke,  Priestley,  Erskine,  Sheridan,  Kosciusko,  Lafay 
ette.  The  remainder  are  of  a  wholly  personal  nature,  full 
either  of  early  aspiration,  or  maturer  despondency  ;  cheerful 
and  ardent,  or  instinct  with  a  mild  yet  manly  melancholy. 
The  two  we  extract,  are  typical  of  the  different  traits  we  have 
mentioned. 


OLD    AND    LATER    ENGLISH    SONNETS.  67 

Here  is  that  noble  address, 

TO  THE  AUTHOE  OF  THE  ROBBERS. 

Schiller  !  that  hour  I  would  have  wished  to  die, 
If  through  the  shuddering  midnight  I  had  sent 
From  the  dark  dungeon  of  the  tower  time-rent, 
That  fearful  voice,  a  famished  father's  cry — 
Lest  in  some  after  moment,  aught  more  mean 
Might  stamp  me  mortal !     A  triumphant  shout 
Black  horror  screamed,  and  all  her  goblin  rout 
Diminished  shrunk  from  the  more  withering  scene  ! 
Ah,  bard  !  tremendous  in  simplicity  ! 
Could  I  behold  thee  in  thy  loftier  mood 
Wandering  at  eve  with  finely-frenzied  eye 
Beneath  some  vast  old  tempest-swinging  wood  ? 
Awhile  with  mute  awe  gazing  I  would  brood: 
Then  weep  aloud  in  a  wild  ecstasy. 

This  in  a  different  vein.  It  is  in  reply  "  to  a  friend  who 
asked  how  I  felt  when  the  nurse  first  presented  my  infant  to 
me." 

Charles !  my  slow  heart  was  only  sad,  when  first 
I  scanned  that  face  of  ffeble  infancy  : 
For  dimly  on  my  thoughtful  spirit  burst 
All  I  had  been,  and  all  my  child  might  be  ! 
But  when  I  saw  it  on  its  mother's  arm, 
And  hanging  at  her  bosom  (she  the  while 
Bent  o'er  its  features  with  a  tearful  smile), 
Then  I  was  thrilled,  and  melted,  and  most  warm 
Impressed  a  father's  kiss ;  and  all  beguiled 
Of  dark  remembrance  and  presageful  fear, 
I  seemed  to  see  an  angel  form  appear — 
Twas  even  thine,  beloved  woman  mild  ! 
So  for  the  mother's  sake  the  child  was  dear, 
And  dearer  was  the  mother  for  the  child. 


68  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

With  Keats  we  close  our  very  slight  sketch  of  writers  of 
the  sonnet.  A  late  article  in  Arcturus  Magazine  (Dec.,  1841\ 
has  done  him  true  poetic  justice.  To  this  delicate  apprecia 
tion  of  the  young  English  Poet,  as  Hunt  affectionately  calls 
him,  we  can  add  nothing,  but  only  contribute  a  hearty  assent. 
The  hour  has  come  at  last  for  Keats,  that  always  comes  to 
the  true  poet.  A  brother  bard  (J.  R.  Lowell)  whose  first 
volume  contains  passages  and  poems  Keats  would  have  been 
willing  to  acknowledge,  and  whose  own  delicate  genius  en 
ables  him  to  appreciate  a  cognate  talent,  has  done  honor  to 
the  English  bard  in  stanzas,  that  put  to  the  blush  all  prose 
criticisms.  Poets  should  criticise  each  other,  or  rather  be  the 
most  intelligent  admirers  of  their  respective  talents.  A  critic 
is  "  of  understanding  all  compact,"  and  wants  imagination  to 
relish  the  finest  touches.  "  The  words  of  Mercury  are  harsh 
after  the  songs  of  Apollo." 


IX. 

JEREMY  TAYLOR,  THE  SPENSER  OF  DIVINITY. 

A  POET  should  be  the  critic  of  Jeremy  Taylor,  for  he  was 
one  himself,  and  hence  needs  a  poetic  mind  for  his  interpreter 
and  eulogist.  Bald  criticism  becomes  still  more  barren  (by 
contrast)  when  exercised  on  the  -flowery  genius  of  the  prince 
of  pulpit  orators.  Taylor  thought  in  pictures,  and  his  ideas 
were  shadowed  out  in  lively  images  of  beauty.  His  fancy 
colored  his  understanding,  which  rather  painted  elaborate 


JEREMY    TAYLOR.  69 

metaphors,  "  long  drawn  out,"  than  analyzed  the  complexity 
of  a  problem,  or  conducted  the  discussion  of  a  topic,  by 
logical  processes.  The  material  world  furnished  his  stock  of 
similes.  He  drew  on  it  for  illustrations,  rather  than  seek  them 
in  the  workings  of  his  own  mind.  His  descriptions  are  almost 
palpable.  They  have  an  air  of  reality.  His  landscape  is 
enveloped  in  a  warm  and  glowing  atmosphere  ;  his  light  is 
"  from  heaven."  His  style  is  rich  and  luxuriant.  He  is  all 
grace,  beauty,  melody.  He  does  not  appear  so  anxious  to 
get  at  the  result  of  an  argument,  to  fix  the  certainty  of  a 
proposition,  as  to  give  the  finest  coloring  to  a  received  senti 
ment.  He  is  more  descriptive  and  less  speculative.  He  re 
poses  on  the  lap  of  beauty.  lie  revels  in  hor  creations.  The 
thirst  of  his  soul  was  for  the  beautiful.  This  was  with  him 
almost  synonymous  with  the  good — "  the  first  good  and  the 
first  fair."  Is  it  not  so  ?  Is  not  the  highest  truth  the  highest 
form  of  beauty?  Our  common  idea  of  beauty  is  more  sen 
sual  and  tinged  with  earthliness.  But  the  platonic  and 
spiritual  conception  is  nobler  and  truer. 

There  was  a  period  when  the  volumes  of  Taylor  lay  com 
paratively  neglected:  when  the  Blair  taste  was  dominant. 
This  sensible  but  cold  critic  does  not  even  refer  to  Taylor  in 
his  lecture  on  pulpit  eloquence.  The  present  race  of  critics' 
unlike  Blair,  are  for  elevating  Taylor  as  the  very  first  of 
orators.  Of  pulpit  orators,  he  is,  indeed,  the  Chrysostom  ; 
but  Burke  holds  the  first,  the  highest  place  of  all  oratory. 
With  the  poet's  imagination,  he  had  also  the  logician's  art  and 
the  deep  reflection  of  the  philosopher.  Burke  had  less  mul 
tifarious  acquisition,  and  his  intellect  worked  all  the  better. 
Taylor  had  a  vast  quantity  of  useless  learning,  which  had  the 
ill-effect  of  inducing  a  certain  laxity  of  belief.  I  mean  laxity 
in  a  good  sense.  He  was  too  credulous.  His  faith  as  well  as 


70  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

his  memory  was  equally  tenacious  of  all  statements,  whether 
well  or  ill-founded.  Bishop  Heber  notices  this  individual 
character  of  Taylor  in  his  life. 

Undoubtedly,  Taylor  is  a  first-rate  genius  of  the  descriptive 
kind.  His  strength  lay  in  that ;  and  his  range,  too,  was 
universal.  He  painted  every  scene  and  every  varying  phase 
of  any  one.  He  is  Claude,  Rubens,  Rembrandt  and  Raphael 
combined.  He  unites  softness,  richness,  depth  of  shadow,  and 
pure  beauty, 

Taylor  has  been  called  the  "  Shakspeare  of  Divinity" —  a 
parallel  that  requires  some  limitation.  If,  by  this,  it  be 
meant  that,  compared  with  other  preachers,  he  had  a  richer 
fancy,  greater  copiousness  of  poetic  sentiment,  and  an  un 
equalled  profusion  of  beautiful  metaphor,  the  praise  is  just ; 
but  if  it  be  intended  to  express  that,  like  Shakspeare,  he  was 
gifted  with  an  union  of  wonderful  and  various  powers,  almost 
superhuman,  the  criticism  is  extravagant,  if  not  absurd.  For, 
in  his  printed  works,  we  can  find  not  a  gleam  of  wit  or  humor 
— scarcely  any  talent  for  portrait-painting — no  profound  depth 
of  reflection — no  nice  observation  of  real  life.  We  say  this 
with  no  intention  of  undervaluing  Taylor  ;  but  only  to  show 
the  folly  of  any  close  comparison  between  him  and  Shakspeare. 
We  would  rather  say,  Taylor  was  the  Spenser  of  Divinity. 
With  Spenser,  Taylor  is  eminently  a  descriptive  writer.  His 
imagination  is  pictorial;  and,  although  without  the  allegory 
of  Spenser,  he  has  the  same  bland  amenity  of  sentiment — 
the  same  untiring  particularity  of  description — the  same  an 
gelic  purity  of  thought — the  same  harmonious  structure  of 
composition. 

Taylor  is  the  painter :  inferior  to  Barrow  in  point  of  reason, 
and  to  Clark  in  reasoning ;  without  a  tithe  of  South's  wit  or 
epigrammatic  smartness  :  less  ingenious  than  Donne :  he  has 


JEREMY    TAYLOR.  71 

a  fancy  and  style  far  more  beautiful  than  any  prose  writer 
before  his  time,  and  perhaps  since.  It  has  been  called  "  un 
measured  poetry."  The  Edinburgh  Review  and  Coleridge 
(critics  wide  apart)  have  joined  in  pronouncing  his  writings 
more  truly  poetic  than  most  of  the  odes  and  epics  that  have 
been  produced  in  Europe  since  his  day.  And  Hazlitt  (surest 
critic  of  all)  quotes  a  fine  passage  from  Beaumont,  which  is 
apparently  a  translation  of  Taylor's  prose  into  verse,  and 
made,  too,  merely  by  occasional  transposition  of  the  words 
from  the  order  in  which  they  originally  stood.  Taylor  is, 
therefore,  confessedly  a  master  of  poetical  prose.  This  term 
is  sometimes  used  by  way  of  dubious  praise,  since  most  writ 
ing  of  the  kind  is  a  wretched  farrago  of  such  tinsel  and  faded 
ornament  as  would  disgrace  Rag  Fair.  Taylor's  composition 
is  of  quite  a  different  grain.  His  style  is  naturally  poetic, 
from  the  character  of  his  mind  ;  he  had  that  poetic  sensibility 
of  feeling  that  saw  beauty  and  deep  meaning  in  everything. 
His  imagination  colored  the  commonest  object  on  which  it 
lighted,  as  the  bow  of  promise  throws  its  tints  over  all  crea 
tion  ;  through  this,  as  a  veil,  every  object  appeared  bright  and 
blooming,  like  the  flowers  of  spring,  or  dark  and  terrible,  like 
the  thunder-cloud  of  summer.  Its  general  hue  was  mild  and 
gentle  ;  he  had  a  more  genial  feeling  for  beauty  than  for  gran 
deur,  though  his  awful  description  of  the  Last  Judgment  is 
stamped  with  the  sublime  force  of  Michael  Angelo,  or  rather, 
like  Rembrandt's  shadows,  terrible  with  excess  of  gloom.  In 
this  grand  picture  are  collected  all  the  images  of  terror  and 
dismay,  fused  into  a  powerful  whole  by  his  so  potent  art.  It 
is  first  a  solemn  anthem — a  version  of  the  monkish  canticle  : 
then  you  hear  (in  imagination)  the  deep  bass  note  of  the  last 
thunder  that  shall  ever  peal  through  the  sky.  You  are  al 
most  blinded  by  the  lightenings  that  gleam  in  his  style. 


CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 


Presently,  a  horrid  shriek  of  despair  (the  accumulated  wail 
ing  of  millions  of  evil  spirits)  rises  on  the  affrighted  ear.  And 
anon,  the  trumpet  with  a  silver  sound  is  blown  several  times, 
and  all  is  still.  With  what  a  subtle  power  this  master  plays 
on  the  conscience  of  his  readers  !  He  makes  the  boldest 
tremble  :  he  magnifies,  he  reiterates,  until  the  best  of  men 
shall  think  himself  a  fellow  of  the  vilest  ! 

Such,  however,  is  not  a  scene  congenial  to  Taylor's  tem 
per.  In  his  description  he  most  affects  the  tender  and  pa 
thetic  notes  of  humanity.  He  plays  admirably  on  every 
chord  of  passion,  but  on  some  much  oftener  and  more  artful 
ly  than  on  others.  He  is  both  "  a  son  of  thunder  and  a  son 
of  consolation."  With  all  his  powers  of  terrifying  the  soul, 
he  most  loves  to  entreat  its  gratitude  to  God  and  the  prac 
tice  of  religion.  He  takes  delight  in  painting  the  innocence 
of  childhood,  the  purity  of  virgins,  the  sacred  mystery  of 
marriage,  the  gentle  voice  of  pity,  the  mercy  of  our  Father, 
the  love  of  his  Son. 

His  landscape  is  oftener  quiet  and  in  repose,  than  savage 
or  deserted.  His  favorite  breezes  are  rather  zephyrs,  than 

The  wind  Euroclydon  — 
The  storm  wind. 

His  florid  genius,  like  his  sweet  disposition,  delighted  in 
heavenly  lays,  and  doubtless  his  piety  was  not  a  little  the 
offspring  of  his  temperament  and  genius. 

Taylor,  in  his  pictures,  further  resembled  Spenser  in  the 
prolixity  of  his  style  —  dwelling  on  minute  points  and  care 
fully  finishing  every  trait.  He  had  none  of  Milton's  concise 
force,  that  painted  a  picture  by  an  epithet  or  a  line.  If  Tay 
lor  had  the  building  of  Pandemonium,  he  would  have  occu 
pied  six  times  the  space  Milton  took  for  its  construction. 


JEREMY    TAYLOR.  73 

Milton  made  it  to  "rise  like  an  exhalation;"  Taylor  would 
have  expanded  the  line  into  a  page,  where  each  member  of 
the  sentence  would  have  formed  a  series  of  steps  leading 
from  the  foundation  to  the  dome  of  the  Infernal  Hall. 

It  may  be  proper  here  to  notice  ti  peculiarity  of  Taylor's 
illustrations — they  are  almost  always  for  ornament ;  he  does 
not  employ  a  simile  to  clench  his  argument ;  he  does  not 
make  his  fancy  logical;  but  describes  and  paints  for  the 
pleasure  of  the  picture.  His  similes,  so  delightful  in  the 
reading,  must  have  been  intolerably  long  for  delivery.  Pub 
lic  speaking  requires  greater  compactness  of  mind  than  Tay 
lor  possessed,  and  yet  we  hear  of  his  wonderful  success, 
which  was  not  slightly  heightened  by  a  beautiful  person,  a 
face  "  like  an  angel,"  and  an  elocution  that  ravished  all  hear 
ers  with  its  swelling  cadences  and  sweet  intonations. 

Tavlor,  in  his  frequent  and  curious  quotations,  is  almost  a 
Burton.  A  reason  for  this  deference  to  foreign  testimony 
may  be  gathered  from  the  fact  of  the  respect  for  authority 
cherished  by  the  early  divines.  Just  loosed  from  the  Church 
of  Rome,  it  was  but  natural  they  should  cling  to  the  first 
vouchers  of  the  truth,  the  primitive  defenders  of  the  faith. 
Modern  free-thinking  and  the  fashionable  doctrine  of  inde 
pendency  of  opinion  had  not  yet  made  those  morning  stars 
of  the  church  to  rely  too  completely  on  their  own  internal 
light— they  rather  reflected  and  gave  back  the  light  from 
above. 

4 


X. 


CHURCH    MUSIC. 

"  I  think  he  hath  not  a  mind  well-tempered,  whose  zeal  is  not  inflamed  by  a 
keavenly  anthem." — Owen  Feliham. 

THERE  is  no  music  like  church  music,  nor  any  songs  of  equal 
excellence  with  the  songs  of  Zion.  Light,  airy  strains  de 
light  the  ear  and  enervate  the  sense,  but  reach  not  the  soul ; 
dull,  mournful  tones  induce  melancholy  and  sadness  ;  but  the 
songs  of  praise  and  thanksgiving,  of  exultant  hope  and  reli 
gious  joy,  of  repentance  and  gratitude,  touch  the  heart  more 
nearly,  affect  the  soul  in  her  inmost  recesses,  and  descend 
into  the  very  depths  of  a  troubled  and  contrite  spirit.  The 
hopeful  Christian,  too,  is  cheered  by  devout  music,  breathing 
peace  and  rest.  And  he  must  be  a  most  indifferent  auditor 
who  can  listen,  unmoved,  to  any  species  of  church  music,  of 
whatever  sect,  or  to  whatever  degree  of  refinement  it  attains. 
For  my  own  part,  I  love  all,  from  the  simplest  Methodist 
hymn  to  the  richest  cathedral  vespers  of  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church  :  and  I  believe  there  is  a  species  of  pure,  devotional 
feeling  that  cannot  fitly  be  told  in  language,  nor  manifested 
in  any  other  way,  that  is  exhibited  in  music.  Prayer  and 
preaching  have  their  fit  place,  and  are  of  essential  importance 
in  divine  worship  ;  but  praise  must  not  be  absent.  Psalmody 
is  prayer  set  to  music ;  and  the  majestic  anthem  is  no  less 
than,  a  more  elevated  form  of  address  to  the  Almighty 
Father.  External  harmony  is  but  the  exponent  of  a  finer 
internal  sense  of  order  and  design  ;  and  that,  we  are  taught, 
is  "Heaven's  first  law."  Without  organ  music,  and  the 
vocal  accompaniment  of  a  choir,  the  services  of  the  church 
appear  shorn  of  a  large  portion  of  their  dignity  and  beauty, 


CHURCH    MUSIC.  75 

and  wanting  in  an  important  feature.  This  feeling  we  are 
happy  to  share  with  the  master  spirits  of  our  church,  the  tes 
timonials  of  some  of  whom,  to  the  efficacy  and  fascination  of 
this  Christian  Art,  we  shall  presently  enumerate. 

We  call  this  a  Christian  Art,  and  such  it  certainly  is.  In 
the  middle  age,  and  just  before  the  revival  of  learning,  when 
the  modern  arts  first  took  their  rise  and  origin,  all  of  the  arts 
at  present  styled  the  fine  arts,  were  consecrated  wholly  to 
the  service  of  the  Church.  The  architecture  of  that  period 
was  the  Gothic,  especially  adapted  to  churches,  though  after 
wards  employed  in  other  buildings,  the  castellated  mansion 
of  the  noble,  and  the  palace  of  the  king.  The  first  modern 
paintings  were  of  our  Saviour,  and  the  Virgin  Mary,  and  the 
Apostles,  and  the  scenes  and  incidents  of  the  Old  and  New 
Testaments.  The  music  was  choral  and  religious ;  the 
orisons  of  the  monk,  the  matins  of  the  friar,  the  mass  and 
vespers  of  the  chapel.  The  eloquence  was  purely  and  almost 
restrictedly  Episcopal,  or  Missionary.  Even  the  Drama  had 
its  first  beginning  in  the  representation  of  Mysteries  and  Mo 
ralities.  And  to  bring  down  the  illustrations  to  our  own  day, 
we  find  Christianity  the  prominent  symbol  of  the  Arts  ;  or 
rather  the  Arts,  the  peculiar  ministers  of  Religion.  Thus 
we  still  see  no  nobler  edifices  than  those  consecrated  to  the 
worship  of  the  true  God ;  St.  Peter's,  St.  Paul's,  Notre 
Dame,  the  Madelaine,  York  Minster,  and  the  noble  churches 
of  Germany.  The  finest  paintings  of  Raphael,  of  Guido,  of 
Corregio,  of  Titian,  of  Murillo,  of  Rubens,  of  Rembrandt, 
and  of  Leonardo  di  Vinci,  are  from  Scripture  subjects,  and 
themes  sacred  to  the  Christian.  Sacred  music,  in  the  hands 
of  Handel,  Mozart,  and  Beethoven,  is  beyond  all  other  mu 
sic;  and  it  should  be  our  peculiar  pride,  that  much  of  our 
noble  church  music  came  fresh  from  the  glowing  hand  and 


76  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

seraphic  ear  of  the  immortal  Handel.  Tn  point  of  eloquence, 
no  oratory  yet  lias  equalled  that  of  the  pulpit.  We  speak 
advisedly  (with  Taylor,  and  Massillon,  and  Whitfield,  and, 
greatest  of  all  orators,  St.  Paul,  in  our  eye).  We  say,  as 
we  know,  nothing,  of  the  fathers  and  Roman  Catholic  doc 
tors  ;  but  unless  a  general  conspiracy  has  arisen  to  pervert 
the  truth,  their  writings  must  contain  a  mine  of  rich  thoughts, 
elaborate  reasonings,  and  brilliant  fancies.  But  of  the  En 
glish  divines  we  can  speak  from  some  acquaintance ;  and  we 
feel  amply  warranted  in  declaring,  that  they  have  (as  a  body) 
never  been  equalled,  in  kind  or  degree,  in  point  of  natural  or 
acquired  gifts  ;  embracing  the  wide  circle  of  eloquence,  argu 
ment,  wit,  fancy,  erudition,  and  research.  The  noblest  poetry 
of  not  only  modern  times,  but  of  all  times,  is  deeply  devout. 
The  greatest  epic  the  world  has  produced,  is  founded  on  sa 
cred  story  ;  and  the  writings  of  all  true  poets  have  ever  been 
instinct  with  a  spirit  of  awful  reverence,  of  charity,  and  com 
prehensive  love,  and  of  sympathy  with  the  good,  the  beauti 
ful,  and  the  true  ;  and  this  is  Christianity.  We  have  digres 
sed  from  the  main  point,  and  yet  not  wandered  into  any  very 
irrelevant  train  of  thought.  For  the  whole  subject  is  closely 
connected,  in  all  its  parts ;  and  what  is  true  of  music  as  a 
Christian  art,  is  equally  true  of  the  other  arts  ;  of  architecture, 
painting,  eloquence,  and  poetry. 

The  elegant  Home  has  left  a  sermon  on  Church  Music, 
which  we  have  not  been  able  to  procure ;  but  which  we  re 
commend  to  our  readers.  The  finest  thing,  however,  we 
have  met  with  on  this  subject,  is  that  magnificent  passage  of 
Hooker,*  which  may  be  readily  turned  to,  but  is  too  long  for 
transcription. 

Feltham  and  Sir  William  Temple  have  both  hit  upon  the 
*  Book  v.,  §  38. 


CHURCH    MUSIC.  77 

same  quotation,  a  notion  of  the  Fathers,  that  God  loves  not 
him  who  loves  not  music ;  and  they  taught,  that  a  love  of 
music  was  a  species  of  predestinated  assurance  of  a  man's  ac 
ceptance  with  heaven.  Of  music,  and  hymns,  and  lyres,  and 
the  trumpet,  and  golden  harps,  we  read  in  Scripture  ;  and 
that  there  are  hallelujahs  in  heaven ;  and  though  some  blas 
pheming  wit  sneeringly  asked  if  heaven  were  a  singing- 
school,  we  may  affirm  that,  amidst  the  choicest  incense  offered 
to  the  adorable  Trinity,  may  very  reasonably  be  included  a 
celestial  harmony  of  voice  and  instrument,  such  as  mortal 
ears  have  never  heard,  and  such  as  human  imaginations  may 
not  dare  to  conceive.  But  let  us  see  what  others,  and  great 
names  too,  have  to  say  on  this  topic.  We  shall  adduce  only 
those  instances  occurring  to  us  readily,  and  omit  many  fine 
passages  from  authors  whose  books  we  do  not  happen  to  have 
at  hand. 

Of  Church  Music,  thus  spoke  that  fine  poet  and  true 
Christian,  Dr.  Donne :  "  And  oh,  the  power  of  church  mu 
sic  !  that  harmony,  added  to  this  hymn,  that  raised  the  affec 
tions  of  my  heart,  and  quickened  my  graces  of  zeal  and  gra 
titude  ;  and  1  observe  that  I  always  return  from  paying 
this  public  duty  of  prayer  and  praise  to  God,  with  an  inex 
pressible  tranquillity  of  mind,  and  a  willingness  to  leave  the 
world."  Herbert  truly  loved  church  music.  We  are  told  by 
Izaak  Walton,  that  " llis  chiefest  recreation  was  music;  in 
which  heavenly  Art  he  was  a  most  excellent  master;  and  did 
himself  compose  many  divine  hymns  and  anthems,  which  he 
set  and  sung  to  his  lute  or  viol.  And  though  he  was  a  lover 
of  retiredness,  yet  his  love  to  music  was  such,  that  he  went 
usually  twice  every  week,  on  certain  appointed  days,  to  the 
cathedral  church  in  Salisbury ;  and  at  his  return  would  say, 
'  That  his  time  spent  in  prayer  and  cathedral  music,  elevated 


78  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

his  soul,  and  was  his  heaven  upon  earth?  "  Nor  was  he  con 
tent  with  a  mere  conversational  declaration  of  this  feeling ; 
but  has  given  a  permanent  form  to  the  feeling  in  a  strain  of 
pure,  devotional  harmony  : 

CHURCH    MUSIC. 

Sweetest  of  sweets,  I  thank  you.     When  displeasure 

Did  through  my  body  wound  my  mind, 
You  took  me  thence :  and  in  your  house  of  pleasure 

A  dainty  lodging  me  assign'd. 

Now  I  in  you,  without  a  body  move, 

Rising  and  falling  with  your  wings. 
W«  both  together  sweetly  live  and  love, 

Yet  say  sometimes,  "  God  help  poor  kings." 

Comfort,  I'll  die ;  for  if  you  part  from  me, 

Sure  I  shall  do  so,  and  much  more ; 
But  if  I  travel  in  your  company, 

You  know  the  way  to  heaven's  door. 

The  author  of  Paradise  Lost,  of  Comus,  and  the  Areo- 
pagitica,  has  left  on  record  his  admiration  of  church  music. 
He  was  a  master  of  the  art  of  music,  and  played  daily  on  the 
organ  ;  and  one  of  the  chief  traits  of  his  glorious  epic  is  the 
admirable  adaptation  of  sound  to  sense,  an  exquisite  sense  of 
harmony  and  rhyme.  Who  can  forget  that  rich  passage 
in  II  Penseroso,  rising  like  "  a  steam  of  rich  distilled  per 
fumes." 

But  let  my  due  feet  never  fail, 
To  walk  the  studious  cloister's  pale, 
And  love  the  high  embowered  roof, 
With  antic  pillars  massy  proof, 


CHURCH    MUSIC.  79 

And  storied  windows  richly  dight, 

Casting  a  dim  religious  light. 

There  let  the  pealing  organ  blow 

To  the  full  voicd  quire  btlow, 

In  service  high  and  anthems  clear, 

As  may  with  sweetness,  through  mine  ear, 

Dissolve  me  into  ecstasies, 

And  bring  all  heavn  before  mine  eyes. 

Truly  Milton,  though  in  his  creed  a  Puritan,  or  rather  an 
Independent  (of  his  own  sort),  and  in  his  politics  a  Repub 
lican,  was  still,  in  his  poetry,  captivated  by  the  romance  and 
splendor  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church.  Macaulay  has, 
with  great  nicety  hit  off  the  distinction.  "  The  illusions," 
says  that  brilliant  declaimer,  "  which  captivated  his  imagina 
tion,  never  impaired  his  reasoning  powers.  The  statesman 
was  proof  against  the  splendor,  the  solemnity,  and  the  ro 
mance,  which  enchanted  the  poet.  Any  person  who  will  con 
trast  the  sentiments  expressed  in  his  Treatises  on  Prelacy, 
with  the  exquisite  lines  (above  quoted)  on  Ecclesiastical  Ar 
chitecture  and  Music,  in  the  Penseroso,  which  was  published 
about  the  same  time,  will  understand  our  meaning.  This  is 
an  inconsistency  which,  more  than  anything  else,  raises  his 
character  in  our  estimation,  because  it  shows  how  many  pri 
vate  tastes  and  feelings  he  sacrificed  in  order  to  do  what  he 
considered  his  duty  to  mankind.  It  is  the  very  struggle  of 
the  noble  Othello.  His  heart  relents ;  but  his  hand  is  firm. 
He  does  naught  in  hate,  but  all  in  honor.  He  kisses  the 
beautiful  deceiver  before  he  destroys  her."  Four  excellent 
witnesses,  admirable  as  Poets  and  Christians,  are  enough  to 
confirm  the  integrity  of  our  proposition ;  and  we  have  ad 
duced  the  testimony  of  Hooker,  of  Donne,  of  Herbert,  and 
of  Milton. 


80  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

Perhaps,  after  all,   there  is  a  nobler  music  than  what  is 
commonly  recognised   as  such  ;    we  mean    "  the    music   of 
speech,"  the  music  of  a  rich,  varied,  and  expressive  elocution. 
Man  has  not  been  able  to  contrive  any  instrument  of  equal 
power  and  versatility  with  that  natural  organ  bestowed  upon 
him  by  his  Maker.     The  human  voice  is  more  complicated 
and  exquisite  than  the  great  Harlasm  organ,  or   the  finest 
Cremona  violin.    It  is  the  mastery  of  art  to  approach  nature ; 
but  here  we  have  nature  above  the  imitation  of  art.     We  are 
old-fashioned  enough  to  love  good  reading,  which  is  much  rarer 
than  good  singing.     We  have  now-a-days  few  Duchets  (the 
name  of  the  clergyman  of  whom  Writ  wrote  with  such  en 
thusiasm)  ;  and  it  must  be  confessed  that,  to  the  generality  of 
clergymen,  however  learned  or  eloquent,  or  amiable  for  private 
virtues,  the  censure  of  Addison  still  applies,  which  was  levelled 
at  the  slovenly,   careless,  and   irreverent  performance  of  the 
most  sacred  duty  of  the  priest — Prayer. 


XI. 

MR.    BRAHAM.* 


WHEN  we  first  heard  Mr.  Braham  in  his  opening  Sacred 
Concert  at  the  Tabernacle,  we  were  sadly  disappointed.  We 
thought  then,  as  we  do  now,  that  he  overlaid  the  majestic 
simplicity  of  sacred  music  with  a  profusion  of  useless  and  un- 
meaaing  nourishes,  mere  tricks  of  voice  and  execution,  ca 
dences,  trills,  and  absurd  repetitions.  Wonderful  power,  the 


1841. 


MR.    BRAHAM.  81 

more  astonishing  at  his  advanced  age,  and  equally  wonderful 
science  we  could  not  help  acknowledging,  but  his  pathos  ap 
peared  labored  and  his  enthusiasm  mechanical.  We  did  re 
cognise  a  portion  of  the  fine  scorn  Lamb  spoke  of  in  that 
magnificent  piece, "Thou  shalt  dash  them  to  pieces,"  wherein 
his  contemptuous  tones  were  jerked  out  with  the  same  force 
that  the  fretted  waves  break  and  storm  upon  a  rock  in  the 
raging  sea.  Afterwards  at  the  theatre,  on  each  occasion  of 
our  visits  there,  we  were  equally  dissatisfied.  The  very  in 
different  acting  was  not  relieved  by  any  very  extraordinary 
singing.  It  was  the  extravagance  and  (paradoxical,  yet  true) 
the  constraint  of  the  Italian  opera.  But  a  few  evenings  ago, 
at  the  Stuy vesant  Institute,  we  at  last  discovered  the  secret  of 
Braham's  powers,  It  is  not  only  the  amazing  extent,  or 
clearness,  or  melody  of  his  voice,  nor  the  rapid  execution,  nor 
the  brilliant  expression  merely,  but  (as  in  all  men  of  true 
genius)  it  lies  in  the  harmonious  sympathy  between  the  spirit 
of  the  man  and  the  talent  of  the  singer.  He  sang  admirably, 
the  noble  heroic  songs  from  Scott  and  Burns,  not  only  be 
cause  he  sang  with  power,  but  also  with  love.  lie  then  and 
there  sang  out  himself,  to  speak  after  the  manner  of  the  Ger 
mans.  The  honest,  hearty,  manly  old  strains,  heroic  or  naval, 
or  even  moral,  of  England  and  Scotland,  are  the  true  songs 
for  Braham  to  sing.  Before  we  heard  Braham,  we  fancied  to 
our  eye  a  sort  of  poetical  High  Priest  in  Israel,  a  majestic 
figure  of  a  man  uttering  tones  of  unearthly  depth  and  beauty, 
in  a  style  austere,  grand,  and  solemn.  But  Old  Hundred 
was  the  only  specimen  of  the  kind  Mr.  Braham  gave  of  him 
self  to  any  advantage.  To  hear  Braham  in  "  Scots  wha  hae 
wi'  Wallace  bled,"  or  "  The  Blue  Bonnets  are  over  the  Bor 
der,"  in  which  his  frequent  animated  calls  sound  like  the 
acute  reports  of  a  rifle  ;  or  "The  Last  Words  of  Marmion," 


CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

where  he  displays  the  greater  variety,  from  great  force  to  fine 
tenderness,  slowness  and  vivacity,  spirit  and  sentiment,  we 
say,  to  hear  these  is  to  hear  the  finest  singing  that  is  to  be 
heard  at  the  present  day.  The  rich  philosophy  and  fine 
poetry  of  "  A  Man's  a  Man  for  a'  that,"  was  delivered  in  a 
proud  strain,  evincing  the  generous  spirit  of  the  singer.  The 
hearty  naval  songs  of  old  England  are  great  favorites  with 
Braham,  He  sings  them  with  all  the  joyaunce  of  a  jolly  Jack 
Tar,  that  creature  of  impulse  and  heart,  and  with  a  spirit  of 
defiance  at  fortune,  and  a  manly  cordiality  of  feeling,  that 
smack  of  the  children  of  the  sea.  Mere  sentimental  songs 
Mr.Braham  sings  badly.  He  has  a  taste  and  a  faculty  above 
them  ;  he  should  "  chaunt  the  old  heroic  ditty  o'er,"  and 
leave  Moore  and  Haynes  Bay  ley  to  the  lesser  lights  of  the 
hour.  He  has  force  and  elevation,  but  little  of  mere  ele 
gance  or  softness — he  is  the  Jupiter  Tonans,  and  not  the 
graceful  Mercurius. 


XII. 

THE    LIFE    AND    ADVENTURES    OF    PHILIP    QUABLL. 

THIS  delightful  story,  the  favorite  of  the  child's  library  about 
a  century  ago,  has  now  fallen  into  almost  entire  obscurity, 
from  which  we  trust  a  late  London  republication  of  the 
book  may  revive  it.  It  is  a  designed  and  palpable  imitation 
of  Robinson  Crusoe,  tjie  popularity  of  which  led  to  a  swarm 
of  imitations,  amongst  which  the  above  and  the  Adventures 
of  P&er  Wilkins  are  by  far  the  most  ingenious,  and  so  full 


LIFE    AND    ADVENTURES    OF    PHILIP    QUA11LL.  88 

of  freshness  and  invention  as  to  deserve  to  pass  for  originals. 
"The  Adventures  of  the  English  Hermit"  were  first  pub 
lished,  in  chapters,  in  a  weekly  newspaper,  called  the  Public 
Intelligencer,  shortly  after  the  appearance  of  Robinson  Crusoe, 
which,  in  like  manner,  had  been  printed  in  a  paper  with  which 
Defoe  was  connectt-d.  So  we  see  our  supposed  modern  fashion 
of  continuing  a  work  of  fiction  through  successive  numbers  of 
a  periodical  is  by  no  means  so  original  a  plan  as  we  had  sup 
posed  in  the  hands  of  Hook,  Dickens,  Marryatt,  and  a  host 
of  their  copyists.  Our  own  impression  had  led  us  to  believe 
that  Launcelot  Greaves,  Smollett's  least  admirable  work,  was 
the  first  English  novel  that  had  appeared  in  the  pages  of  a 
periodical,  but  here  we  have  a  precedent  a  hundred  years 
previous.  Like  Peter  Wilkins,  and  Gaudentio  di  Lucca,  the 
author  of  Philip  Quarll  is  unknown.  One  who  signs  him 
self  Edward  Dorringtun,  a  iivm  uii  plume,  we  suppose,  is  the 
apparent  compiler  of  the;  book  ;  but  we  have,  now-a-days, 
seen  revealed  all  the  arts  of  publication,  and  know  very  well 
that  editor  often  means  an  author  who  palms  oft'  his  own 
writings  as  the  lucubrations  of  other  people.  These  scanty 
facts  we  glean  from  the  preface  to  the  late  edition,  and  they 
afford  all  the  actual  information  we  have  been  able  to  collect 
on  the  subject.  Dunlop  is  entirely  silent,  in  his  history  of 
Fiction,  as  to  the  very  existence  of  Philip  Quarll,  though  he 
mentions  Peter  Wilkins  with  praise  ;  in  which  said  history 
he  has  finished  the  department  of  English  fiction  with  com 
parative  indifference  and  in  the  briefest  manner. 

To  confess  the  truth,  we  have  ourselves  only  a  short  time 
since  met  with  the  Adventures,  and  feel  that  we  have,  by  so 
lato  a  reading,  been  deprived  of  the  pleasant  retrospections 
to  which  the  perusal  of  a  book  of  this  sort  always  gives  rise. 
There  are  classic  works  which,  if  not  read  in  early  childhood, 


84  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

lose  their  principal  charm,  which  consists  of  a  pleasure  con 
nected  with  early  associations,  such  as  are  peculiar  in  them 
selves,  and  which  no  other  period  of  our  life  may  afford  us. 
In  this  class  of  books  we  place  all  the  fairy  tales  and  voyages 
imaginaires,  as  Gulliver's  Travels,  Robinson  Crusoe,  Peter 
Wilkins,  and  Philip  Quarll  (Gaudentio  di  Lucca  is  the  single 
book  of  the  kind  above  a  mere  childish  imagination,  but 
worth  a  text-book  on  ethics  for  the  boyish  youth).  Pure 
allegory  is  best  relished  then.  We  read  Pilgrim's  Progress 
with  constant  delight  before  the  age  of  ten  years,  but  have 
never  been  able  to  get  through  five  pages  since  ;  and  the 
Holy  War  we  give  up  in  despair,  being  quite  past  relishing 
the  glories  of  that  mortal  combat  between  the  Flesh  and  the 
Devil.  Oriental  tales,  as  the  Arabian  Nights  and  Persian 
Tales,  are  very  captivating  to  a  fancy  delighted  with  gaudy 
pictures,  and  a  taste  adulterated  by  the  crudities  of  igno 
rance  ;  so,  too,  for  a  different  reason,  are  startling  matter-of- 
fact  relations — as  the  adventures  of  Munchausen  or  Baron 
Trenck.  All  of  these  are  really  beneficial  to  young  minds  ; 
but  the  class  of  books  we  consider  most  useful  for  children 
are  combinations  of  books  of  adventures  and  matter-of-fact 
relations,  as  Quarll's  adventure,  where  a  child  is  not  only 
impressed  with  generous  sentiments,  and  taught  to  follow  a 
manly  model  of  character,  but  also  learns,  and  in  the 
pleasantest  manner,  something  of  geography  and  of  natural 
history.  A  book  like  this  is  better  than  a  sermon  or  a  moral 
lecture,  for  with  delight  it  instills  truth,  and  gives  an  impulse 
to  the  affections,  while  it  stimulates  the  perceptions  of  the 
understanding. 

To  instruct  children  to  advantage,  we  must  charm  their 
imaginations  and  touch  their  hearts  ;  through  these  avenues 
we  excite  the  natural  piety  instinct  in  the  most  fallible  of 


LIFE    AND    ADVENTURES    OF    PHILIP    QUARLL.  85 

human  creatures,  and  awaken  the  dormant  love  of  virtue, 
which  (and  not  that  accursed  doctrine  of  natural  depravity), 
is  the  true  birthright  of  man.  By  these  means,  too,  we 
invigoratje  and  enlighten  the  reason,  the  master  faculty,  and 
thus  in  effect  gain  far  more,  and  in  a  more  pleasing  manner, 
than  if  we  had  gone  directly  to  work,  and  frightened  or 
stupified  our  little  pupils  into  the  practice  of  a  decorous 
behavior  and  the  acquisition  of  the  mere  signs  of  knowledge. 
We  are  sorry  to  see  the  present  race  of  writers  of  books  for 
children  adopting  the  unwise  course  of  pragmatically  insist 
ing  upon  a  didactic  manner  in  works  of  fiction.  In  the 
midst  of  all  the  cants  of  the  day,  we  are  in  danger  of  being 
surfeited  with  the  cant  of  useful  knowledge,  and  the  cant  of 
human  perfectibility.  Certainly  all  knowledge  (even  of  the 
worst  sort)  has  its  uses  ;  but  for  the  love  of  variety,  my 
masters,  let  us  have  a  little  (so  called)  useless  knowledge.  It 
will  at  least  serve  as  a  relief  to  the  mind ;  and  of  goodness, 
though  we  cannot  have  too  much,  we  beg  there  may  be  less 
talking  and  more  performance.  We  did  not  wonder  that 
Harriet  Martineau  could  bore  children  with  tirades  upon 
frugality  and  the  circle  of  domestic  virtues,  but  we  are  sorry 
to  see  even  Miss  Sedgwick  and  charming  Mary  Ilowitt 
getting  to  be  too  moral  by  half;  and,  to  crown  our  surprise, 
Captain  Marryatt  is  overriding  the  useful  knowledge  hobby 
at  such  a  pace,  that  we  fear  he  will  soon  be  found  flounder 
ing  in  the  dirt.  In  the  midst  of  all  this,  we  are  gratified  to 
bring  into  notice  an  old  work  with  a  new  interest,  to  present 
our  juvenile  acquaintance  with  a  new  treasure  to  their  former 
literary  store,  an  accession  they  will  not  readily  renounce. 

Our  first  acquaintance  with  Philip  Quarll  arose  out  of  the 
encomiums  we  met  upon  it  in  two  or  three  passages  of  Leigh 
Hunt's  writings,  and  the  favor  with  which  it  was  received  by 


86  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

that  glorious  circle  which,  met  at  Lamb's  Wednesday  evening 
parties.  What  fascinated  three  generations  of  children  might, 
we  logically  inferred,  attract  a  fourth  ;  and  so  we  took  up  the 
work  with  the  intention  of  saying  something  about  it,  if  we 
were  so  fortunate  as  to  catch  the  spirit  of  it.  This  intention 
was  confirmed  and  excused  (for  we  foolishly  enough  imagined 
the  readers  of  the  Boston  Miscellany  might  consider  a  notice 
of  an  old  child's  book  too  trifling  for  their  regard),  by  the 
article  of  Hunt*  on  Peter  Wilkins,  a  work  of  similar  charac 
ter,  and  of  which  we  have  something  to  say  before  we  stop. 
Of  Philip  Quarll,  beyond  a  couple  of  sentences  or  so,  we 
have  seen  a  criticism  nowhere,  and  have  the  ground,  a  virgin 
soil,  entirely  to  ourselves. 

Let  us  premise  that  in  our  critical  capacity  we  write  to 
the  parents  ;  genius  alone  can  write  up  to  the  purity  of  the 
innocent  child.  We  may  have  our  say,  and  talk  learnedly 
enough,  but  it  is  Mr.  Hawthorne  who  can  present  his 
Fancy's  Show-box,  and  fix  the  roving  eye  of  childhood  as 
by  a  magic  spell.  As  we  love  children,  however,  we  shall  be 
glad  to  act  even  as  subordinate  to  their  best  teachers,  the 
father  and  mother,  they  to  whom  they  owe  life  and  the  fos 
tering  care  of  it,  gratitude  inferior  only  to  that  we  all  owe 
to  the  Father  of  our  fathers,  and  the  merciful  protector  of 
their  offspring. 

To  make  an  end  of  what  seems  to  be  getting  interminable, 
we  come  at  once  to  our  new  acquaintance.  The  Adventures 
of  Philip  Quarll  are  prefaced  by  a  long  and  very  agreeable 
account  of  the  discovery  of  the  same  Philip  Quarll,  by  the 
aforesaid  Mr.  Dorrington.  Our  present  notice  might  be  en 
titled  a  discovery  of  the  discovery  of  Philip  Quarll,  to  which 
is  added  the  adventures,  <fec.  Mr.  Dorrington,  we  are  told, 
*  The  Seer,  xxxi.,  Part  First. 


LIFE    AND    ADVENTURES    OF    PJIILIP    QUARLL.  87 

was  a  British  merchant,  who  on  his  return  to  England  from 
a  voyage  of  mercantile  adventure,  by  accident  made  the  dis 
covery  of  an  island  in  the  South  Sea,  which  had  been  sup 
posed  uninhabited,  and  even  unapproachable  for  landing,  on 
account  of  the  difficulties  of  access  to  it;  but  on  which  was 
found  an  English  hermit,  who  had  lived  there  solitary  and 
alone  (as  Mr.  Benton  might  add),  not  only  conveniently,  and 
with  comfort,  but  perfectly  resigned  and  happy,  for  the  space 
of  fifty  years.  The  account  of  the  discovery  includes  a 
description  of  the  dress,  habitation  and  utensils  of  Quarll,  and 
a  long  report  of  the  conversation  held  with  him.  Of  the 
dress,  manner  of  life,  <tc.,  we  will  only  remark  a  close  simi 
larity  to  the  minuteness  and  particularity  of  the  descriptions 
and  narrative  of  Robinson  Crusoe.  This,  and  the  internal 
evidence  of  the  story,  and  its  conduct,  induces  us  to  suspect 
Defoe  himself  of  the  authorship  of  the  book;  a  supposition 
highly  probable,  when  we  consider  the  demand  fur  that  class 
of  writings,  excited  by  the  Crusoe  of  the  same  author,  his 
wonderful  copiousness,  and  his  natural  desire  to  enhance  the 
value  of  the  first  book,  by  an  imitation  of  it.  This  is  a  mure 
supposition  of  our  own  ;  yet  analogous  circumstances,  a  repe 
tition  of  incidents  even,  lead  us  to  su>pect  that  by  chance  we 
may  have  hit  upon  the  real  author.  The  very  concealment 
of  the  author's  name  might  be  employed  as  an  argument  on 
our  side  of  the  question.  Do  foe  had  nothing  to  gain  after 
writing  Robinson  Crusoe,  by  copying  himself;  and  then  the 
similarity  is  so  strong  in  all  points,  down  to  the  very  home 
liness,  and  yet  expressiveness  of  the  style,  that  we  cannot 
think  it  a  mere  copy,  since,  at  the  same  time,  it  discovers  .->o 
much  internal  force  and  naturalness,  which  a  mere  copyist 
would  not  be  likely  to  possess.  Be  that  as  it  may,  Quarll  is 
Crusoe  slightly  altered.  He  is  older,  naturally  more  devout, 


88  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

and  a  greater  lover  of  solitude  ;  but  equally  a  lover  of  animals 
and  of  nature,  equally  expert  as  a  mechanic  and  planter ;  like 
Robinson  Crusoe,  cast  by  a  shipwreck  on  a  desert  island,  like 
him  recovering  the  most  necessary  articles  from  the  wreck. 
There  are  a  few  points  of  dissimilarity.  Crusoe  is  trans 
ported  at  the  thought  of  returning  home,  while  Quarll  will 
not  leave  his  beloved  retreat.  The  former  hermit  is  con 
tinually  in  dread  of  the  Anthropophagi,  while  the  latter  is 
only  once  visited  by  two  thievish  Indians,  who  fly  at  his 
approach.  Quarll  has  no  man  Friday,  but  a  favorite  mon 
key,  Beaufidelle.  The  coincidences  are  much  more  numerous  ; 
Quarll  finds  a  turtle,  like  Crusoe,  turns  it  on  its  back  to  keep 
it,  uses  the  shell  for  a  dish  and  a  kettle  combined,  preserves 
his  fresh  fish,  flesh,  and  fowl,  in  the  salt  water.  His  building, 
and  furnishing,  are  of  a  piece  with  Robinson  Crusoe's  ;  so 
too  his  daily  rounds,  his  devotional  exercises.  These  last 
were  somewhat  particular;  Quarll  was  a  man  of  a  religious 
turn,  never  forgot  to  ask  a  blessing,  return  thanks  at  his 
meals,  nor  his  daily  devotions.  His  evening  exercises  are 
picturesquely  described;  he  regularly  resorted  to  a  place 
where  echoes  were  wonderfully  multiplied  and  prolonged, 
and  being  gifted  with  a  noble  voice,  which  had  been  highly 
cultivated,  he  filled  the  valley  or  cavern  with  a  thousand 
melodious  airs,  In  this  book,  as  in  its  prototype,  we  find  the 
same  ceaseless  requisitions  and  provisions  for  the  appetite. 
Quarll  is  always  getting  in  his  fish  and  chestnuts,  and  pick 
ling  his  mushrooms,  and  entrapping  a  hare  or  a  duck.  We 
get  a  little  tired  of  this,  when  reading  on  a  full  stomach, 
or  in  a  large  town  ;  but  on  a  deserted  island  the  three  meals 
must  be  the  chief  objects  of  worldly  thoughts.  Quarll's  mon 
keys  play  an  important  part  in  the  narrative,  and  fill  a  large 
place  in  his  benevolent  affections.  His  long  beard  is  as 


LIFE    AND    ADVENTURES    OF    PHILIP    QUARLL.  89 

characteristic  as  Robinson's  fur  cap,  which  made  us  regard 
him  as  a  grenadier,  in  our  childish  days :  the  old  man, 
though  eighty-eight  when  discovered,  could  sneeze  like  a 
man  of  thirty  :  had  a  powerful  voice,  and  an  uncommonly 
vigorous  frame.  He  was  almost  a  giant  in  his  muscular 
power,  yet  mild  as  an  humble  Christian.  The  only  defects 
about  Quarll  are  those  of  clothing:  from  his  waist  up  he  is 
naked  ;  he  has  no  sort  of  covering  for  his  head,  and  his  feet 
are  bare  of  shoes  and  stockings.  We  think  the  author  ought 
to  have  furnished  him,  at  least,  with  an  umbrella,  and  a  pair 
of  buckskin  slippers ;  he  might  have  sent  them  ashore  on  a 
wave  from  the  wreck,  or  have  prevailed  on  the  voyagers  to 
leave  them  for  future  use.  As  it  is,  our  venerable  friend 
looks  as  if  a  severe  winter  would  give  him  a  bad  cold,  from 
wet  feet,  and  in  summer  there  was  imminent  danger  of  a  sun 
stroke.  To  leave  this  trifling,  and  add  to  the  force  of  our 
former  argument,  we  annex  a  short  passage  from  an  account 
of  Mr.  Dorrington's  .voyage  home,  which  is  as  like  Defoe's 
style  as  Moll  Flanders  is  like  the  History  of  the  Plague,  in 
point  of  manner,  or  as  any  one  work  of  the  same  author  is 
like  any  other : 

"  Having  refreshed  ourselves  very  well  on  this  island  (Juan 
Fernandez),  we  resolved  to  steer  for  Cape  Verde  in  Chili.  On 
the  12th  we  made  the  island  of  St.  Jago,  where  we  anchored, 
and  sent  our  boat  ashore.  Here  we  bought  some  hogs  and 
black  cattle  for  our  voyage  round  Cape  Horn  to  the  Brazils 
as  also  some  corn  and  maize. 

"  We  weighed  anchor  on  the  20th,  and  sailed  from  hence 
round  Cape  Horn.  Round  the  Cape  the  weather  favored  us 
extremely;  and  nothing  happened  that  was  material,  only 
that  we  were  chased  by  a  pirate  ship,  for  about  twelve  hours 
on  the  29th ;  but  the  night  coming  on,  it  favored  us,  so  that 


90  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

we  lost  her.  On  the  4th  of  September  we  made  Falkland's 
Islands,  and  Cape  St.  Antonio,  near  the  mouth  of  the  River 
de  la  Plata,  in  Paraguay,  on  the  25th ;  when  we  stood  out 
to  sea,  and  made  the  island  of  Grande,  on  the  coast  of  Bra 
zil,  on  the  29th,  We  have  received  a  letter  from  our  owners, 
commanding  us  home,  and  not  to  sail  for  New  England,  as 
designed.  Here  we  got  beef,  mutton,  hogs,  fowls,  sugar, 
rum,  oranges,  and  lemons,  so  that  now  we  did  not  want  for 
good  punch." 

Does  not  this  read  like  a  page  out  of  a  veritable  log-book 
from  the  hand  of  Daniel  Defoe  ? 

The  account  of  Quarll  is  written  in  the  third  person,  in 
stead  of  being  an  autobiography.  For  this  reason  we  con 
ceive  that  it  loses  a  portion  of  its  spirit.  It  is  a  work  no  less 
curious  than  interesting,  and  contains  much  valuable  matter 
of  a  miscellaneous  character.  It  is  interspersed  with  judi 
cious  reflection,  and  enlivened  by  agreeable  pictures.  It  re 
lates  singular  facts.  It  is  withal  highly*  characteristic  of  the 
subject  of  it,  and  full  of  a  personal  interest.  To  confirm  this 
criticism,  we  must  not  delay  giving  the  reader  specimens 
under  each  head.  Previously  to  doing  this  we  will  extract  a 
longer  passage  than  the  preceding,  to  give  the  reader  a  better 
taste  of  our  author's  general  manner.  It  is  all  over  Defoe. 
It  relates  a  passage  in  the  solitary  existence  of  Quarll : 

"  About  forty  paces  farther  he  found  a  chest  in  a  cleft  of 
the  rock,  which  had  been  washed  up  there  by  the  violence 
of  the  storm.  After  thanking  heaven  for  its  mercy  in  send 
ing  this  gift,  he  tried  to  lift  it,  but  could  not ;  he  was  there 
fore  obliged  to  fetch  his  hatchet  to  break  it  open,  that  he 
might  take  away  what  was  in  it  by  degrees.  Having  taken 
as  much  of  the  sail  cloth  as  he  could  conveniently  carry,  with 
the  few  oysters  he  had  got,  he  went  home  and  fetched  the 


LIFE    AND    ADVENTURES    OF    PHILIP    QUARLL  91 

tool,  wrenched  open  the  chest,  from  which  he  took  a  suit  of 
clothes  and  some  fine  linen.  'These,' said  he,  '  neither  the 
owner  nor  I  want ;'  so  laid  them  down.  The  next  thing  he 
took  out  was  a  roll  of  parchment,  being  blank  indentures  and 
leases  ;  'there,'  said  he,  'are  instruments  of  law,  and  are  of 
ten  applied  to  injustice  ;  but  I'll  alter  their  mischievous  pro 
perties,  and  make  them  records  of  Heaven's  mercies,  and 
Providence's  wonderful  liberality  to  me  ;  instead  of  being  the 
ruin  of  some,  they  may  chance  to  be  the  reclaiming  of  others.' 
At  the  bottom  of  the  chest  lay  a  runlet  of  brandy,  a  Cheshire 
cheese,  a  leather  bottle  full  of  ink,  with  a  parcel  of  pens,  ink, 
and  a  penknife  ;  '  as  for  these,'  said  he,  '  they  are  of  use  ;  the 
pens,  ink,  and  parchment,  have  equipped  me  to  keep  a  jour 
nal,  which  will  divert  and  pass  away  a  few  anxious  hours. 
By  degrees  he  took  home  the  chest  and  its  contents ;  and 
now  having  materials  to  begin  his  journal,  he  immediately 
fell  to  work  ;  that  for  want  of  other  books,  he  might  at  his 
leisure  peruse  his  past  transactions,  and  the  many  mercies  he 
had  received  from  heaven ;  and  that  after  his  decease  who 
ever  might  be  directed  hither  by  Providence,  upon  reading 
his  wonderful  escapes  in  the  greatest  of  dangers,  his  mira 
culous  living  when  remote  from  human  assistance,  in  the  like 
extremity  he  should  not  despair.  Thus  he  began  from  his 
being  eight  years  old,  to  the  day  of  his  being  cast  away, 
being  then  twenty-eight  years  of  age,  resolving  to  continue  it 
to  his  death." 

It  can  hardly  be  expected  that  we  should  attempt  the 
barest  outline  of  incidents  in  a  magazine  article.  We  can 
only  touch  a  few  points  in  a  very  cursory  manner. 

The  hero  of  the  adventures  is  a  philosopher  by  nature  and 
from  circumstances  :  he  has  got  a  habit  of  reflection,  and  is 
perpetually  moralizing  on  the  most  familiar  aspects  of  nature, 


92  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

and  the  most  ordinary  occurrences  of  life.  Thus,  walking 
along  the  sea  shore,  he  perceives  at  the  foot  of  a  rock,  "  an 
'extraordinary  large  whale,  which,  cast  there  by  the  late  high 
wind,  had  died  for  want  of  water.  There  were  shoals  of 
small  fishes  swimming  about  it  in  the  shallow  water  wherein 
it  lay  as  rejoicing  at  its  death."  Upon  this  he  remarks, 
"  Thus  the  oppressed  rejoice  at  a  tyrant's  fall.  Well,  happy 
are  they  who,  like  me,  are  under  heaven's  government  only." 
He  then  with  his  knife  cut  several  slices  of  the  whale  and 
threw  them  to  the  small  fishes,  saying,  "  It  is  just  ye  should, 
at  last,  feed  on  that  which  so  long  fed  on  you ;"  a  homily 
which  admits  of  a  political  construction.  Here  recurs  an 
other  instance  of  his  philosophic  turn.  "  One  day,  having 
walked  the  island  over  and  over,  he  proceeded  to  view  the 
sea,  whose  fluid  element  being  ever  in  motion,  affords  new  ob 
jects  of  admiration.  The  day  being  very  fair,  and  the  weather 
as  calm,  he  sat  down  upon  the  rock,  taking  pleasure  in  seeing 
the  waves  roll,  and,  as  it  were,  chase  one  another ;  the  se 
cond  pursuing  the  first,  and  being  itself  overtaken  by  a  suc 
ceeding,  until  they  sunk  altogether.  'This,' said  he, 'is  a 
true  emblem  of  ambition  ;  men  striving  to  outdo  one  another 
are  often  undone.' " 

As  he  was  making  reflections  on  the  emptiness  of  vanity 
and  pride,  and  returning  thanks  to  heaven  that  he  was  sepa 
rated  from  the  world,  which  abounds  in  nothing  so  much,  a 
ship  appeared  at  a  great  distance,  a  sight  he  had  not  seen 
since  his  shipwreck.  "  Most  unlucky  invention,  said  he,  "  that 
ever  came  into  a  man's  thoughts.  The  ark,  which  gave  the 
first  notion  of  a  floating  habitation,  was  ordered  for  the  pre 
servation  of  man  ;  but  its  fatal  copies  daily  expose  him  to  des 
truction."  Notwithstanding  his  philosophy,  Quarll  is  thrown 
into  deep  distress  by  the  failure  of  an  attempt  to  reach  the  is- 


LIFE    AND    ADVENTURES    OF    PHII-IP    QUARLL.  93 

land,  on  the  part  of  the  sailors.     This  was,  however,  brief. 

Again,  he  misses  an  opportunity  of  escape.  On  a  third 
occasion,  an  endeavor  is  made  to  carry  him  oft*  by  force,  for 
exhibition.  This  was  unsuccessful.  A  fourth  chance  of  re 
lease  is  repulsed  by  him,  having  determined  to  spend  the 
remnant  of  his  life  in  his  (now)  beloved  retreat. 

Our  hermit  has  a  lively  talent  for  coloring,  an  agreeable, 
descriptive  fancy.  rlhe  following  present  a  few  examples  : 

Antelopes.  "Having  a  majestic  presence,  body  and  limbs 
representing  a  stag,  and  the  noble  march  of  a  horse." 

A  beautiful  unknown  bird.  "  He  contemplated  with  de 
light  on  the  inexpressible  beauty  of  the  feathers,  which  on  the 
back  were  after  the  nature  of  a  drake's,  every  one  distinguish 
ed  from  the  other  by  a  rim  round  the  edge,  about  the  breadth 
of  a  large  thread,  and  being  of  a  changeable  color,  from  red 
to  aurora  and  green  ;  the  ribs  were  of  a  delightful  blue,  and 
the  feathers  pearl-color,  speckled  with  a  bright  yellow ;  the 
breast  and  belly,  if  they  might  be  said  to  be  of  any  particular 
color,  were  that  of  dove's  feathers,  rimmed  like  the  back,  di 
versely  changing ;  the  head,  which  was  like  that  of  a  swan 
for  make,  was  purple,  changing  as  if  moved  ;  the  bill  like 
burnished  gold  ;  the  eyes  like  a  ruby,  with  a  rim  of  gold 
around  them  ;  the  feet  the  same  as  the  bill  ;  the  size  of  the 
bird  was  between  that  of  a  middling  £Oose  and  a  duck,  and 

O    o 

in  shape  it  somewhat  resembled  a  swan." 

Can  this  be  a  veritable  picture  or  a  fanciful  extravagance  ? 
A  little  farther  on  is  the  description  of  a  bird  somewhat  si 
milar,  but  still  more  gorgeous  in  its  plumage. 

The  sea  monster  he  paints  a  horrible  creature,  and  with  the 
Gorgon  terrors  of  Behemoth  himself.  It  is  evidently  an  im 
aginary  phantasm.  "  A  form  without  likeness,  and  yet  com 
parable  to  the  most  terrible  part  of  every  frightful  creature  ;  a 


94  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

large  head,  resembling  that  of  a  lion,  bearing  three  pair  of 
horns  ;  one  pair  upright,  like  that  of  an  antelope,  another 
pair  like  wild  goats',  two  more  bending  backwards  ;  its  face 
armed  all  round  with  darts,  like  a  porcupine  ;  with  great  eyes 
sparkling  like  a  flint  struck  with  a  steel ;  its  nose  like  a  wild 
horse,  always  snarling ;  the  mouth  of  a  lion  and  teeth  of  a 
panther,  the  jaws  of  an  elephant,  and  the  tusks  of  a  wild 
boar,  shouldered  like  a  giant,  with  claws  like  an  eagle,  bodied 
and  covered  with  shells  like  a  rhinoceros,  and  the  color  of  a 
crocodile."  In  this  fertile  region,  Quarll  meets  with  number 
less  instances  of  the  prodigality  of  nature  ;  the  rarest  fruits, 
fowls,  and  fishes ;  forests  of  beautiful  trees,  sometimes  of  mi 
raculous  size,  one  covered  with  its  branches  a  whole  acre ; 
while  another  grew  for  the  same  extent,  so  closely  interwoven 
in  its  branches,  which  seemed  almost  to  spring  from  the  roots, 
as  to  form  an  impenetrable  barrier,  a  sort  of  natural  picket  or 
palisade.  Monkeys  were  the  hermit's  pets,  and  he  would 
sometimes  excite  a  quarrel  between  two  varieties,  the  green 
and  grey  species,  to  induce  reflections  on  the  folly  of  brawl 
ing  and  fighting.  For  invariably  a  third  party  came  in  and 
stole  away  the  spoils  for  which  they  were  contending. 

A  pleasant  instance  of  our  hermit's  loyalty  is  mentioned  in 
the  introduction  to  the  adventures  by  the  compilers  of  them, 
in  whose  hands  Quarll  left  his  MSS.;  which,  at  the  same  time, 
fixes  the  general  date  of  the  work.  At  the  repast  given  by 
the  old  man  to  Dorrington,  the  health  of  George  III.  was 
drunk  ;  and  an  eulogium  passed  upon  his  character,  to  which 
some  dissenting  criticism  might  be  offered. 

We  have  now  endeavored  to  give  the  reader  a  general 
idea  of  Philip  QuarlPs  adventures,  but  trust  he  will  speedily 
consult  that  history  itself  to  verify  our  conjectures  in  part, 
but  more  particularly  for  the  amusement  and  profit  of  an  en 
tire  perusal. 


LIFE    AND    ADVENTURES    OF    PHILIP    QUAHLL.  95 

Peter  "Wilkins  we  can  hardly  pretend  to  write  upon  after 
Hunt.  But  we  may  retain  a  remembrance,  and  hazard  a 
conjecture.  It  was  our  first  play  (the  story  dramatized)  and 
hence  can  by  no  possibility  be  forgotten,  as  such  an  occasion 
forms  an  epoch  in  the  life  of  every  individual.  We  cannot 
think  the  author  of  Philip  Quarll  and  Peter  Wilkins  are  one 
and  the  same  person,  for  with  a  great  similarity,  an  element 
entirely  original  is  introduced  into  the  latter,  the  author  of 
which  displays  a  more  copious  invention  and  a  more  spiritual 
fancy  than  the  author  of  the  first  work.  Both  are  admirable 
of  their  kind,  a  class  now  quite  extinct,  and  to  the  re-produc 
tion  of  which,  our  present  race  of  story-tellers  appear  quite 
inadequate  from  a  want  of  faith,  a  want  of  invention,  a  want 
of  simplicity,  and  a  want  of  exact  truth  and  fidelity  of  imagi 
nation. 


XIII. 


1  There  are  no  colors  in  the  fairest  sky 
So  fair  as  these.     The  feather  whence  the  pen 
Was  shaped  that  traced  the  lives  of  these  good  men, 
Dropped  from  an  Angel's  wing.     With  moistened  eye 
We  read  of  faith  and  purest  Charity 
In  Statesman,  Priest,  and  huniLle  citizen  ; 
0  could  \ve  copy  their  mild  virtue?,  then 
What  joy  to  live,  what  blessedness  to  die  ! 
Methinks  their  very  names  shine  still  and  bright ; 
Apart,  like  glow-worms  on  asBummer  ni^ht, 


96  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

Or  lonely  tapers  when  from  far  they  fling 
A  guiding  ray ;  or  seen,  like  stars  on  high, 
Satellites  burning  in  a  lucid  ring 
Around  meek  Walton's  heavenly  memory." 

WORDSWORTH. 

IN  the  whole  circle  of  English  literature,  a  volume  more 
unique  and  attractive  to  the  best  class  of  readers  cannot 
easily  be  found,  than  the  Lives  of  Walton.  The  most  en 
thusiastic  praises  of  the  acutest  critics  have  conferred  an 
enviable  immortality  on  their  admirable  author,  which,  added 
to  the  sweet  and  manly  character  of  Honest  Izaak,  have 
united  to  give  his  book  a  place  on  the  shelf  above  that  of 
many  writers  of  greater  reputation  and  more  brilliant  genius. 
On  a  work  of  such  excellence  and  so  well  known,  we  shall  not 
now  dwell  with  more  particularity. 

Our  object  at  present  will  be,  to  consider  the  principal 
features  common  to  the  Lives,  arid  the  personal  as  well  as 
literary  character  of  Walton  himself.  A  certain  family  like 
ness  exists  between  all  the  different  heroes  of  Walton,  and  a 
similar  mode  of  handling  the  relation  of  their  lives.  Thus 
all  of  them — Donne,  Wotton,  Herbert,  Hooker,  Sanderson 
— were  remarkable  for  their  early  studies  as  well  as  precocity 
of  genius  :  each  was  a  liberal  scholar  and  devoted  to  his  call 
ing  :  each  was  a  firm  and  zealous  churchman  :  all  of  them, 
but  Wotton  were  divines,  and  he  was  a  sort  of  lay  preacher : 
they  were  all  most  fortune  in  their  deaths,  regular  and  happy 
in  their  lives,  even  Hooker,  notwithstanding  his  'domestic 
trials.  In  their  tempers  and  dispositions,  they  were  men  of 
great  mildness  and  moderation :  of  a  charitable  turn,  given 
to  hospitality  and  the  company  of  their  friends,  liberal  think 
ers,  inclined  to  innocent  pleasantry,  utterly  devoid  of  cunning 
or  deceit,  sincere  Christians  arid  unpretending  philanthropists. 


WALTON'S  LIVES.  97 

Yet  with  all  these  points  in  common,  each  was  possessed  of 
a  marked  individuality  of  character  and  genius.  Though 
both  of  them  poets,  and  fine  poets,  the  sentiment  of  Herbert 
is  quite  different  from  the  fancy  of  Donne,  and  that  again 
from  the  reflection  of  Wotton.  Hooker  and  Sanderson,  able 
on  the  same  topics,  displayed  talents  quite  diverse ;  the  one 
being  more  of  a  general  philosophical  inquirer,  the  other  more 
of  a  theoretical  casuist.  There  can  be  no  stronger  argument 
for  the  purity  and  innocence  of  Walton's  life,  than  the  fact 
that  these  were  his  personal  friends — companions  of  his  choice, 
who  thought  it  no  want  of  dignity  in  them  to  associate  with 
the  simple-hearted  author  of  the  Complete  Angler.  Tho. 
Lives  are  written  with  considerable  minuteness,  and  are  yet 
very  general,  minute  in  particular  instances,  but  general  in 
the  main  outlines.  They  uniformly  commence  with  an  apo 
logy  for  his  unfitness  for  the  task  of  historical  narrative,  and 
excuses  for  the  defects  of  style  and  manner.  This  was  not, 
in  all  probability,  an  affectation,  but  real  diffidence. 

The  youth  and  prime  of  Walton  having  been  passed  in 
the  pursuit  of  trade  and  commerce,  his  education  had  been 
of  a  very  miscellaneous  character,  picked  up  from  desultory 
reading  and  the  conversation  of  tho  divines  with  whom  he 
was  a  great  favorite,  and  of  whom  he  was  a  decided  admirer. 
Commencing  authorship,  too,  late  in  life,  he  felt  the  clogs  of 
business  and  tho  want  of  freedom  in  his  ideas  and  composi 
tion.  This  he  soon  attained,  and  if  his  style  never  became 
perfect,  yet  it  was  original  of  its  kind,  and  such  as  no  art  of 
rhetoric  could  teach. 

Prefixed  to  the  Lives  is  a  biography  of  Walton,  by  Dr. 

Zoueh,  the  same   who  wrote  the  life  of  Sir  Philip  Sidney. 

He  has  made  a  better  preface  of  the  first,  than  his  stupid 

volume  on  the  latter  personage,  though  his  passing  criticisms 

5 


98  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

on  Donne  and  Fuller  smack  of  the  trained  critic  of  the  formal 
French  school  of  criticism  of  the  eighteenth  century. 

The  profession  of  Walton  is  known  to  have  been  that  of  a 
wholesale  linen-draper  or  Hamburgh  merchant.  His  first 
initiation  into  trade  is  thought  to  have  been  in  one  of  the 
shops  where,  in  company  with  other  industrious  young  men, 
he  was  placed  by  the  munificence  of  Sir  Thomas  Gresham 
(tl»e  English  Medici,  and  founder  of  the  Royal  Exchange), 
who  had  erected  sereral  in  the  upper  part  of  his  celebrated 
building.  After  a  course  of  prudent  management,  of  frugality 
and  assiduous  labor,  Walton,  at  the  age  of  fifty  years,  retired 
from  business,  resolving  to  spend  the  rest  of  his  years  in  the 
practice  of  his  social  and  religious  duties,  and  to  cultivate  his 
powers  by  reading,  conversation  and  reflection.  A  moderate 
independency  satisfied  the  simple  desires  of  this  contented 
Christian  philosopher,  and  he  was  too  wise  a  man  not  to 
leave  the  turmoil  of  business  as  soon  as  his  circumstances 
warranted  the  removal.  Unlike  our  modern  money-seekers, 
he  preferred  ease  and  a  quiet  conscience  to  extravagance  and 
display,  and  the  laborious  tasks  requisite  to  meet  large  de 
mands.  Immediately  on  leaving  trade,  he  turned  author,  and 
he  affords  one  example  more  of  the  good  writers  who  have 
arisen,  not  from  the  peasantry  alone  (which  class  boasts  a 
Burns,  a  Hogg,  and  a  Bloomfield),  but  from  the  middling 
classes  of  society,  as  Richardson  the  novelist,  who  was  a  prin 
ter  ;  Defoe,  a  hosier ;  and  even  lower,  Ben  Jonson,  a  brick 
layer,  and  Dodsley,  a  footman,  who  became  a  writer  and 
publisher.  We  think  we  can  perceive  the  effects  of  his  busi 
ness  habits  in  the  writings  of  Walton,  in  his  method  and  ac 
curacy,  which  it  is  becoming  the  fashion  to  impeach,  his  spe 
ciality,  and  honest  dealing. 

The  literary  character  of  Walton  is  distinguished   by  the 


WALTON'S  LIVES.  99 

same  sincerity  and  pure  feeling  that  mark  his  personal  dispo 
sition.  Good  sense,  a  reverence  for  the  wise  and  good,  a 
natural  piety,  and  unfeigned  simplicity,  are  the  principal  cha 
racteristics  of  the  author  as  well  as  of  the  man.  His  garrulity 
(in  some  cases  the  effect  of  age,  he  wrote  the  life  of  Sanderson 
in  his  eighty-fifth  year,)  is  the  innocent,  free  talk  of  a  familiar 
friend  ;  yet  it  must  be  confessed  this  inclination  to  gossip  and 
to  accept  reports  and  traditions  as  true  history,  has  led  him, 
in  some  cases,  to  statements  that  have  been  charged  with 
being  one-sided  and  partial. 

Beside  those  features  of  his  personal  character  already 
mentioned,  one  occurs,  and  exceedingly  prominent,  his  loyalty. 
This  feeling  grew  out  of  his  natural  reverence  for  authority 
and  superiors.  lie  was  also  a  zealous  churchman  for  the 
same  reason,  and  warmly  opposed  the  covenant — and  for  this 
he  suffered  considerably  in  his  temporal  affairs,  as  well  as  in 
the  trials  to  which  his  mild  temper  was  subjected.  A  fast 
friend  to  royalty  and  the  church,  circumstances,  as  well  as  his 
natural  bent,  led  him  to  embrace  that  particular  side.  His 
mother  was  the  niece  of  Archbishop  Cranmer,  and  his  wife 
the  sister  of  Bishop  Ken,  who  has  written  some  fine  hymns, 
and  whom  James  II.  reckoned  the  first  among  the  Protestant 
preachers  of  his  time. 

The  divines  of  that  day,  with  whom  Walton  was  intimately 
associated,  greatly  influenced  his  mind  and  character,  and 
may  .be  said,  by  their  works  and  conversation,  to  have  formed 
his  mind  and  leading  opinions — Donne,  Herbert,  Sanderson, 
Fuller,  Ken,  King,  Usher,  Chillingworth,  and  three  poets,  at 
that  period  the  natural  defenders  of  monarchy  and  nobility, 
Drayton,  Shirley,  the  dramatist,  and  Clialkhill. 

From  the  multitude  of  eulogiums  and  affectionate  allusions 
to  Walton,  living,  and  his  memory  after  death,  we  have  se- 


100  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

lected  the  following  nervous  lines   of  Flatman,   a   forgotten 
poet,  who  has  shown  genius  in  two  or  three  short  pieces. 

Happy  old  man  !  whose  worth  all  mankind  knows, 
Except  himself ;  who  charitably  shows 
The  ready  road  to  virtue  and  to  praise, 
The  road  to  many  long  and  happy  days, 
The  noble  acts  of  generous  piety, 

And  how  to  compass  true  felicity. 
Hence  did  he  learn  the  art  of  living  well  ; 
The  bright  Thealma  was  his  oracle  : 
Inspired  by  her  he  knows  no  anxious  cares, 
Through  near  a  century  of  pleasant  years  ; 
Easy  he  lives  and  cheerful  shall  he  die, 
"Well  spoken  of  by  late  posterity. 

How  correctly  the  poet  has  prophesied,  the  readers  and  ad 
mirers  of  Walton  at  the  present  day  may  answer.  The  name 
occurs  but  once  beside  in  our  own  literature,  and  then  in  a 
work  of  fiction,  the  enchanting  volume  of  Mackenzie  ;  and 
apart  from  the  melancholy  sentiment  and  pathetic  sweetness 
of  that  character,  it  is  a  magic  name,  consecrated  to  the  re 
spect  of  all  scholars,  and  the  love  of  all  good  men  throughout 
the  world. 


XXIX. 

ELIJAH  FENTON. 


IN  a  former  article,  on  Religious  Biography,  the  very  im 
perfect  list  of  English  biographies  that  rank  as  classic  pro 
ductions  in  that  department  of  writing  there  inserted,  includes 


ELIJAH    FENTON.  101 

the  lives  of  Milton  and  Waller,  by  Fenton,  an  author  so  es 
timable  as  a  man,  and  affording  so  agreeable  an  instance  of 
one  class  of  writers,  that,  although  little  known  himself,  and 
author  of  no  very  important  efforts,  we  are  inclined  to  pause 
at  his  name,  and  sketch  his  personal  and  literary  character. 
Fenton  was  emphatically  a  man  of  letters,  a  title  of  dubious 
meaning,  and  that  ought  to  have  a  settled  character.  In  its 
most  enlarged  sense,  it  may  convey  the  idea  of  a  general 
scholar  and  miscellaneous  author,  as  the  term  lawyer,  in  this 
country,  includes  every  department  in  the  profession,  uniting 
the  contrary  pursuits  of  barrister,  special  pleader,  conveyancer, 
and  equity  draughtsman,  which  in  England  are  separately 
followed  as  distinct  professions.  Or  it  may  be  taken  in  the 
the  sense  of  Disraeli,  as  that  body  of  readers  and  students 
standing  between  the  great  body  of  authors  and  the  larger 
body  of  mere  readers  ;  aiding  the  first  as  critics,  or  by  counsel 
and  research,  or  else  acting  the  part  of  interpreters  or  com 
mentators  for  the  last.  The  very  highest  order  of  genius  are 
above  this  class,  and  also  the  first  class,  of  men  of  talent.  A 
poet  almost  inspired,  yet  comparatively  unlettered,  as  Burns 
or  Elliott,  is  not  called  a  man  of  letters,  since  not  a  book-man 
or  scholar.  Yet  he  may  be  much  superior  to  the  mere 
scholar.  Neither  is  the  true  man  of  letters  purely  a  student, 
but  also  an  author.  He  is  not  often  a  voluminous  author, 
unless  he  is  poor,  for  the  delicacy  of  his  taste  will  curb  the 
facility  of  production,  and  give  the  last  finish  to  his  style. 
If  obliged  to  live  by  his  pen,  he  will  write  much,  but  miscel 
laneously,  as  Hazlitt  and  Hunt.  It  is  not  likely  he  will  ever 
attempt  a  long  work,  for,  if  blessed  with  a  competence,  ho 
will  be  too  indolent,  and,  if  pressed  to  write  often,  he  cannot 
write  at  length.  There  are,  then,  two  distinct  divisions  of 
the  class.  Gray  and  Warton,  and,  we  may  add,  Fenton, 


102  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

were  representatives  of  the  first,  and  the  miscellaneous  authors, 
by  profession,  of  the  present  and  past  age,  of  the  last,  as 
Goldsmith,  Johnson,  Cumberland,  Southey,  the  regular  re 
viewers  and  critics,  and  the  ablest  modern  lecturers,  Guizot, 
Cousin,  Carlyle,  etc.  Fenton,  though  poor,  was  almost  always 
attached  to  some  great  man  or  wealthy  patron,  who  was  glad 
to  exchange  a  moderate  pension  for  the  pleasure  of  his  society 
and  conversation,  and,  at  least,  for  the  latter  part  of  his  life, 
though  his  circumstances  were  narrow,  yet  he  was  placed 
above  want  and  the  importunate  calls  of  necessity.  He  could 
write  or  read,  as  he  pleased,  and  he  cared  to  do  little  else. 
"  He  is,"  says  Pope,*  "  a  right  honest  man  and  a  good 
scholar  :  he  sits  within  and  does  nothing  but  read  and  com 
pose."  This  is  the  true  picture.  Mere  amateurs  of  authorship, 
petty  (occasional)  scribblers,  or  deliverers  of  an  annual  ad 
dress  or  a  quarterly  lecture  ;  collectors  of  rare  rhymes,  they 
have  not  the  taste  to  read  or  capacity  to  comprehend  ;  gen 
tlemanly,  fashionable  smatterers  of  learning;  rich  patrons, 
may  call  themselves  "  literary  characters,"  or  "  men  of  letters," 
but  it  is  not  their  proper  designation  ;  they  are  more  worthily 
styled  pretenders,  shallow  coxcombs,  arrogant  fools.  We 
have  met  with  more  than  one  character  of  this  sort.  They 
are  generally  on  lecture  committees,  or  appointed  as  corres 
ponding  secretaries  to  literary  societies.  They  haunt  public 
libraries  and  reading-rooms.  Their  names  are  in  all  the 
newspapers.  These  are  pretenders,  with  full  pockets.  A 
more  unfortunate  pretender,  is  a  poor  author — one  destitute 
in  a  pecuniary  view,  who  takes  up  the  trade  of  authorship 
without  the  means  or  abilities  to  carry  it  on.  Such  a  person 
might  as  well  profess  alchemy  as  literature,  We  are  willing 
to  take  the  experience  of  the  best  judges,  when  we  conclude 
*  Spence. 


ELIJAH    FENTON.  103 

that  a  good  scholar  and  able  writer,  if  not  unfortunate  in  other 
respects,  must  eventually  succeed  in  obtaining  a  respectable 
livelihood,  as  well  as  the  lawyer  or  physician,  above  whom 
he  unquestionably  ranks.  For  he  works  with  the  finest  tools* 
on  the  most  exalted  and  purifying  materials.  Never  let  him 
forget  the  sentence  of  a  master  of  authorship.*  "  Such  a 
superiority  do  the  pursuits  of  literature  possess  above  every 
other  occupation,  that  even  he  who  attains  but  a  mediocrity 
in  them,  merits  the  pre-eminence  above  those  that  excel  the 
most  in  the  common  and  vulgar  j^ro/essicws."  Of  the  gen 
tility  of  literature,  as  a  pursuit  (not  to  say  of  its  noble  aris 
tocracy),  a  paper  might  be  written,  demonstrating  conclusively 
its  generous  scope  and  noble  elevation  ;  but  we  believe  we 
have  pursued  the  subject  sufficiently  for  the  present. 

Of  the  works  of  Fenton,  a  brief  criticism  may  serve.  His 
prose  is  sweet  and  elegant :  his  poetry  pleasing,  but  rerging 
towards  feebleness.  .  In  the  high  sense,  he  was  no  poet,  but 
only  an  agreeable  versifier.  His  lives  are  agreeable  abridg 
ments  of  what  a  common  writer  would  have  swelled  into 
books  of  twelve  times  the  size  ;  but  as  a  miscellaneous 
scholar,  and  chiefly  a  classical  scholar,  was  he  reputed  to  rank 
high.  He  translated  for  Pope  the  first,  fourth,  nineteenth^ 
and  twentieth  books  of  the  Odyssey ;  and  so  smoothly,  that 
they  are  not  generally  distinguished  from  those  of  Pope's 
translation. — He  was  often  engaged  as  private  tutor — for  a 
time  he  was  secretary  to  the  Earl  of  Orrery,  in  Flanders,  and 
tutor  to  his  son,  who  ever  afterwards  mentioned  him  with 
esteem  and  tenderness.  He  was  at  one  time  assistant  in  a 
school,  and  afterwards  kept  a  school  for  himself.  Bolingbroke 
persuaded  him  to  give  this  up,  for  more  honorable  employ 
ment  (as  it  was  thought),  and  court  favor.  Pope  stood  by 
*  Hume. 


104  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

him  under  all  circumstances,  and  procured  him  an  enviable 
situation  as  instructor  and  companion  to  Secretary  Craggs, 
who  died  too  soon  for  the  successful  prosecution  of  the 
scheme.  With  Southerne,  the  dramatic  poet,  Fenton  pre 
served  a  close  intimacy.  At  his  house  he  wrote  his  tragedy 
of  Mariamne,  which  brought  its  author  one  thousand  pounds. 
The  widow  of  Sir  William  Trumbull,  at  Pope's  recommenda 
tion  (who  loved  to  make  his  friends  happy),  invited  Fenton 
to  educate  her  son,  whom  he  accompanied  to  Cambridge. 
Fenton  died  at  the  seat  of  this  excellent  woman,  in  the  ca 
pacity  of  auditor  of  her  accounts — a  species  of  gentleman- 
steward  and  agent.  Pope  wrote  his  epitaph,  a  monument  of 
his  taste  and  affection. 

The  personal  character  of  Fenton  was  delightful — a  temper 
sweet,  yet  not  insipid ;  a  judgment  manly  and  liberal ;  a  taste 
refined,  but  not  fastidious  ;  a  talent  for  conversation,  lively, 
entertaining  and  instructive  ;  integrity  of  the  purest  dye ;  the 
gentlest  consideration  ; — these  were  the  peculiar  character 
istics  of  one  of  the  noblest  of  human  creatures.  "  None  knew 
him  but  to  praise."  His  merits  have  softened  the  severity  of 
Johnson,  and  disarmed  the  satire  of  Pope.  For  the  brevity 
of  his  life,  Johnson  apologizes ;  he  says,  "  it  is  not  the  effect 
of  indifference  or  negligence."  Fenton  was  a  non-jurer,  and 
hence  "  a  commoner  of  Nature  ;"*  but,  though  friendless  and 
poor  (in  his  early  career),  his  biographer  adds,  "  he  kept  his 
name  unsullied,  and  never  suffered  himself  to  be  reduced, 
like  too  many  of  the  same  sect,  to  mean  arts  and  dishonor 
able  shifts.  Whoever  mentioned  Fenton,  mentioned  him 
with  honor."  In  the  lives  of  Milton  and  Waller,  Johnson  re 
fers  with  respect  and  eulogy  to  our  author  ;  and  in  the  life  of 
Pope  he  repeats  his  former  praises — "  The  character  of  Fenton 
*  Johnson. 


ELIJAH    FENTON.  105 

was  so  amiable,  that  I  cannot  forbear  to  wish  for  some  poet 
or  biographer  to  display  it  more  fully  for  the  advantage  of 
posterity.  If  he  did  not  stand  in  the  first  rank  of  genius,  he 
may  claim  a  place  in  the  second;  and,  whatever  criticism 
may  object  to  his  writings,  censure  could  find  very  little  to 
blame  in  his  life."  No  man  may,  with  truth,  assail  Johnson 
for  want  of  heart ;  he  had,  in  fact,  a  truly  humane  disposi 
tion.  Eulogy  of  a  man  from  whom  he  could  expect  nothing 
if  living,  and  to  whom,  dead,  he  owed  no  debt  of  gratitude, 
bespeaks  a  generous  nature.  The  only  defect  in  Fenton  (a 
most  venial  fault  in  him,  though  not  in  others)  was  a  physi 
cal  indolence,  the  effect  of  constitutional  debility.  He  was 
tall  and  corpulent,  sluggish,  a  late  riser,  and  took  little  exer 
cise.  An  attendant,  where  he  once  lodged,  used  to  say  he 
would  "  lie  a-bed  and  be  fed  with  a  spoon."  Pope  said  he 
died  of  indolence  ;  but  his  distemper  was  the  fruit  of  physical 
indolence —the  gout.  A  story  is  told  much  to  his  credit, 
that  we  ought  not  to  omit  repeating: — "At  an  entertain 
ment,  made  for  the  family  by  his  elder  brother,  he  observed 
that  one  of  his  sisters,  who  had  married  unfortunately,  was 
absent ;  and  found,  upon  inquiry,  that  distress  had  made  her 
thought  unworthy  of  invitation.  As  she  was  at  no  great  dis 
tance,  he  refused  to  sit  at  the  table  till  she  was  called,  and 
when  she  had  taken  her  place  was  careful  to  show  her  parti 
cular  attention." 

Such  was  Elijah  Fenton,  a  man  who  exhibited,  in  a  private 
scene,  and  on  a  limited  stage,  the  virtues  of  the  philosopher 
and  of  the  Christian  hero;  evincing,  in  his  patient  forbear 
ance,  his  firm  integrity  and  honorable  poverty,  a  resolution 
and  high  tone  of  principle,  that  more  ennobles  human  nature 
than  the  dazzling  victories  and  gaudy  triumphs  of  the  con 
queror.  This  excellent  man  had  the  tastes,  the  habits,  the 


106  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

acquisitions,  the  pure  aspirations  of  the  genuine  scholar, 
united  to  the  calmness,  the  sagacity  and  moderation  of  the 
philosopher.  A  better  tribute  to  his  memory  than  a  polished 
and  epigrammatic  epitaph,  may  be  read  in  the  following 
letter  of  Pope  to  the  Rev.  Mr.  Brootne,  the  mutual  friend  of 
Pope  and  Fenton,  and  their  associate  in  the  translation  of  the 
Odyssey.  We  annex  it  entire,  with  the  complete  details  : 

"  To  the  Rev.  Mr.  Broome, 

"  At  Pulham,  near  Harlestone,  Nor., 
"  [By  Beccles,  Bag.]  Suffolke. 

"  Dear  Sir, — I  intended  to  write  to  you  on  this  melancholy 
subject,  the  death  of  Mr.  Fenton,  before  yrs  came  ;  but  stay'd 
to  have  informed  myself  and  you  of  ye  circumstances  of  it. 
All  I  hear  is,  that  he  felt  a  gradual  decay,  tho'  so  early  in 
life,  &  was  declining  for  5  or  6  months.  It  was  not  as  I  ap 
prehended,  the  gout  iu  his  stomach,  but  I  believe  rather  a 
complication  first  of  gross  humors,  as  he  was  naturally  cor 
pulent,  not  discharging  themselves,  as  he  used  no  sort  of 
exercise.  No  man  better  bore  ye  approaches  of  his  dissolution 
(as  I  am  told)  or  with  less  ostentation  yielded  up  his  Being. 
The  great  modesty  which  you  know  was  natural  to  him,  and 
ye  great  contempt  he  had  for  all  sorts  of  vanity  and  Parade^ 
never  appeared  more  than  in  his  last  moments ;  he  had  a 
conscious  satisfaction  (no  doubt)  in  acting  right,  and  feeling 
himself  honest,  true,  and  unpretending  to  more  than  was  his 
own.  So  he  dyed,  as  he  lived,  with  that  secret,  yet  sufficient, 
contentment. 

"  As  to  any  papers  left  behind  him,  I  dare  say  they  can 
be  but  few  ;  for  this  reason,  he  never  wrote  out  of  vanity,  or 
thought  much  of  the  applause  of  men.  I  know  one  instance 
where  he  did  his  utmost  to  conceal  his  own  merit  that  way ; 


ELIJAH    FENTON.  107 

and  if  we  join  to  this  his  natural  love  of  ease,  I  fancy  we 
must  expect  little  of  this  sort ;  at  least  I  hear  of  none  except 
some  few  further  remarks  on  Waller  (which  his  cautious  in 
tegrity  made  him  leave  an  order  to  be  given  to  Mr.  Tonson), 
and  perhaps,  though  'tis  many  years  since  I  saw  it,  a  Transla 
tion  of  ye  first  Book  of  Oppian.  He  had  begun  a  tragedy  of 
Dion,  but  made  small  progress  in  it. 

"  As  to  his  other  affairs,  he  dyed  poor,  but  honest,  leaving 
no  debts  or  legacies ;  except  of  a  few  pounds  to  Mr.  Trurn- 
bull  and  my  Lady,  in  token  of  respect,  gratefulness,  and  mu 
tual  esteem. 

"I  shall,  with  pleasure,  take  upon  me  to  draw  this  amia 
ble,  quiet,  deserving,  unpretending  Christian  and  philoso 
phical  character,  in  his  epitaph.  There  truth  may  be  spoken 
in  a  few  words:  as  for  Flourish,  and  Oratory,  and  Poetry,  I 
leave  them  to  younger  and  more  lively  writers,  such  as  love 
writing  for  writing  sake",  and  wd  rather  shew  their  own  Fine 
Parts,  yn  report  the  valuable  ones  of  any  other  man.  So  the 
Elegy  I  renounce. 

"  I  condole  with  you  from  mv  heart  on  the  loss  of  so 
worthy  a  man,  and  a  Friend  to  us  both.  Now  lie  is  gone,  I 
must  tell  you  he  has  done  you  many  a  good  office,  and  set 
your  character  in  ye  fairest  light  to  some  who  either  mistook 
you,  or  know  you  not.  I  doubt  not  he  has  done  the  same 
for  me. 

"  Adieu  :  Let  us  love  his  memory,  and  profit  by  his  ex 
ample — I  am,  very  sincerely, 

"  Dr  Sir, 
"  Your  affectionate  &  real  servant, 

"A.  POPE. 

"Aug.  29,  1730." 


108  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

Thus  wrote,  not  the  just  censor,  the  keen  satirist,  the  brilliant 
moral  painter,  the  gay,  elegant,  courtly  letter-writer,  the  arch 
critic  of  the  artificial  school  of  poetry  and  of  criticism  ;  but  the 
humane,  the  affectionate,  the  friendly  Pope,  out  of  his  very 
heart  of  hearts,  with  earnestness  and  undoubted  zeal.  To 
question  the  truth  of  this  were  to  insult  humanity. 


XV. 

SWEDENBORGIANISM.* 

WE  have  here  two  accredited  expositions  of  the  character  and 
tenets  of  the  Swedenborgian  sect,  by  respectable  clergymen 
of  that  denomination;  and,  in  order  to  satisfy  the  minds  of 
those  inquiring  into  the  truth  and  genuineness  of  these  doc 
trines,  in  ever  so  slight  a  degree,  we  shall  present  a  brief  ab 
stract  of  them ;  but  first,  it  may  be  necessary  to  lay  before 
the  reader  some  account  of  that  extraordinary  man,  Emmanuel 
Swedenborg  ;  for  such,  all  who  study  his  life  and  system  must 
allow  him  to  have  been,  however  they  may  refuse  to  admit 
his  apostolical  or  prophetic  character. 

Swedenborg  was  the  son  of  a  Lutheran  bishop,  and  edu 
cated  with,  perhaps,  something  of  sectarian  rigor.  We  con 
ceive  we  see,  in  this  fact,  an  explanation  of  those  visionary 
theories,  and  that  "  largest  liberty,"  which  occupied  the 

*  "  A  Course  of  five  Lectures  on  the  fundamental  Doctrines  of 
the  New  Jerusalem  Church,"  by  Richard  De  Charms.  92  pp.,  12mo., 
Philadelphia.  "  Barrett's  Lectures,"  12mo.  John  Allen. 


SWEDENBORGIANI8M.  109 

thoughts  of  his  latter  years.  From  a  restricted  bigotry  to 
unbounded  freedom  of  belief,  the  transition  is  neither  uncom 
mon  nor  unnatural.  Yet,  true  to  his  early  education,  Sweden- 
borg  never  left  the  communion  of  the  Lutheran  Church,  but 
remained  a  member  to  the  day  of  his  death.  Many  of  his 
sentiments,  of  a  nobler  morality,  and  much  of  the  spiritual 
interpretation,  which  he  vulgarized  by  its  too  frequent  use, 
might  safely  be  introduced  into  every  sect,  and  into  the  bosom 
even  of  the  true  Church ;  but  then,  purely  in  an  episodical 
manner,  and  not  as  the  only  saving  truth.  Though  writing 
and  teaching  as  "  a  man  sent  down  from  the  Lord,"  yet  it 
is  not  until  after  his  death  that  his  followers  united  together 
to  form,  what  they  assumed  to  style  (with  sufficient  humility 
to  be  sure)  The  New  Church.  Sectarian  arrogance  and  spi 
ritual  conceit  have  rarely  transcended  this. 

Swedenborg  was  early  distinguished  for  quickness,  industry, 
memory  and  enthusiasm.  He  had  a  rich,  luxuriant  fancy,  and 
some  poetical  talent.  He  was  a  chemist,  linguist,  and  ma 
thematician  :  understood  metallurgy  and  anatomy,  and  pos 
sessed  an  inventive  spirit,  and  an  original  vein,  in  all  of  these. 
He  was  more  than  this,  a  clear,  exact,  methodical  man  of 
business  ;  drew  up  the  best  financial  reports,  succeeded  in 
embassies,  and  made  himself  a  useful  statesman.  Altogether, 
he  was  a  man  of  rare  natural  abilities,  with  much  and  various 
culture.  He  rilled  numerous  offices  of  high  trust,  was  enno 
bled  and  honored  with  distioguished  attentions  ;  at  one  time 
the  favorite  of  Charles  XII.;  and,  if  we  are  not  in  error,  he 
converted  a  later  sovereign  to  his  peculiar  views.  Sweden 
borg,  from  all  accounts,  must  have  been  an  honest  man,  a 
pure  man,  a  sincere  Christian,  but  a  religious  enthusiast ;  and, 
as  we  cannot  help  thinking,  possessed  with  a  monomania,  not 
fierce  and  turbulent,  but  gentle  and  spiritual.  It  has  been 


110  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

said,  that  the  study  of  the  Book  of  Revelations  would  turn 
any  man's  head  who  attempts  to  translate  that  mystical  alle 
gory  into  plain  prose.  Newton  (says  a  great  authority)  wrote 
nonsense  on  the  Revelations.  Wise  Dan  Chaucer,  long  since, 
told  his  readers  that 

The  greatest  clerks  are  not  the  wisest  men. 

And  Swedenborg  adds  another  illustrious  name  to  the  list 
of  those  who  attempt  impossible  things;  ranking,  with  the 
inquirers  after  the  longitude,  those  who  seek  to  square  the 
circle,  or  discover  perpetual  motion.  It  were  as  wise  to  hunt 
after  the  art  of  transmuting  the  baser  metals  into  gold,  as  to 
aim  at  a  new  (and  true,  at  the  same  time)  commentary  on 
the  Christian  scheme  and  the  Holy  Scriptures.  From  one  of 
the  best  accounts  of  the  life  of  Swedenborg,  in  the  Encyclo 
paedia  Americana,  to  which  our  attention  has  been  directed 
by  a  Swedenborgian,  we  adopt  a  conclusion  of  the  critic,  that 
Swedenborg  was  rather  a  religious  poet  than  a  scientific 
theologian :  that,  though  a  man  of  a  truly  devotional  spirit, 
he  had  more  of  fancy  in  his  piety  and  his  so-called  visions, 
than  he  himself  imagined.  His  country,  his  temperament, 
his  very  name  smacks  of  mysticism.  His  followers  deny 
this  :  but  we  want  no  other  proof  of  it,  than  some  of  his  own 
pretentious,  and  the  titles  of  some  of  his  works.*  What  man 
but  he,  save  Quevedo  in  satire,  and  Virgil,  with  Dante  and 
Milton,  in  epic  poesy,  ever  pretended  a  picture  of  Hell  ? 
Swedenborg  gives,  also,  a  minute  description  of  Heaven  and 
the  Angelic  Spirits.  We  have  heard  the  Swedish  Apostle 
compared  to  Jacob  Boehmen,  and  we  suspect  a  close  parallel: 
it  is  said  that  the  former  was  obliged  to  the  earlier  mystic, 
for  many  ideas  and  images.  Even  Emerson,  very  lately, 
*  Arcana  Celestia,  the  Apocalypse,  and  Angelic  Wisdom. 


SWEDENBORO IANISM.  1 1 1 

spoke  of  Swedenborg  as  the  greatest  poet  since  Dante,  thereby 
greatly  alloying  his  prophetic  character.  For  the  introduction 
of  fancy  into  religion  leaves  too  much  room  for  the  exercise 
of  human  invention.  A  poetical  religionist  is  likely  to  be  an 
unsafe  biblical  critic.  We  see  this  exemplified  in  the  strange 
mixture  of  ancient  Christianity  and  Xeo-Platouism,  where 
the  distinctive  doctrines  of  each  were  so  confused  as  to  impair 
the  verisimilitude  of  the  former,  and  give  too  high  authority 
to  the  visions  of  the  latter.  This  grew  to  so  great  an  evil, 
that  after  the  separation  of  the  two  diverse  elements,  the  doc 
trine  of  the  Trinity  itself,  the  very  corner-stone  of  Christianity, 
came  to  be  considered,  by  some,  a  relic  of  Platonism.  The 
prophets  of  old  spake  from  a  celestial  inspiration  ;  the  impos 
tors  of  modern  days  (wo  do  not  rank  Swedenborg  among  con 
scious  impostors),  the  Mother  Ann  Lees,  of  the  Shakers ;  the 
Joe  Smiths,  of  the  Mormons,  etc,  seek  the  light  of  their  own 
unenlightened  reason,  and  the  vain  boastings  of  a  copious, 
but  ill-regulated  fancy.  The  Apostles  of  old  were,  most  of 
them,  plain,  unlettered  men.  Modern  pseudo-apostles  are 
men  of  some  acquirements,  and  a  ready  invention.  To  make 
a  genuine  Christian  disciple,  Faith  and  Love  only  are  wanting 
(both,  how  rare  !) ;  but,  to  make  a  fashionable  and  popular 
vulgar  saint,  some  vigour  of  character  and  physical  constitu 
tion  is  necessary ;  but  more  of  a  dazzling  showy  species  of 
talent,  with  a  vast  fund  of  impudence  and  imperturbable  self- 
reliance.  We  believe  Swedenborg  to  have  been  a  good  man, 
iu  most  respects  ;  and  in  some  particulars,  a  great  man  ;  but 
like  many  men,  both  great  and  good,  he  was  vain,  or  worse ; 
and  enthusiastic  (in  the  sense  of  weakness,  not  a  manly, 
vigorous  enthusiasm)  to  an  extraordinary  degree.  Neither 
of  these  qualities  is  incompatible  with  great  sincerity,  and 
even  elevation  of  mind  ;  and  for  these  traits  we  reverence  his 


112  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

character.  Swedenborg  is  represented  as  a  man  of  uncom 
monly  clear  judgment,  which  we  must  either  wholly  deny,  or 
else  impugn  his  character  for  veracity,  for  humility,  and  for 
philosophical  consistency.  Regarding  him  in  the  light  of  a 
herald  of  a  new  day,  the  forerunner  of  a  purer  age,  we  can 
only  speak  of  Swedenborg  as  the  dupe  of  his  own  fancies,  and 
without  a  particle  of  respect  for  his  spiritual  and  characteristic 
pretentions.  In  those  passages  where  he  exhorts  to  spiritual 
love,  and  purity  of  life  and  thought,  he  displays  a  noble  spirit. 
Mr.  De  Charms  has  a  section  (pp.  47,  8],  that  unfolds  this 
divine  principle.  But,  in  doctrinal  points,  he  is  sometimes  far 
wrong;  often  perfectly  at  variance  with  well  ascertained 
Christian  Doctrine  ;  sometimes  crude,  sometimes  almost  blas 
phemous. 

Of  this  doctrine  we  shall  attempt  a  brief  sketch.  The 
Swedenborgian  believes  his  to  be  the  (New  Jerusalem) 
Church  ;  and  that  the  final  judgment  took  place  somewhere 
in  the  middle  of  the  last  century  ;  that  a  new,  and  truer,  and 
purer  dispensation,  commenced  with  Swedenborg;  and  al 
though  they  speak  of  him  as  merely  a  herald  of  a  new  era, 
arid  interpreter  of  the  Scriptures,  as  a  servant  of  the  Lord  ; 
still  they  assume  for  his  interpretation  and  teaching  (as  it 
seems  to  us)  equal  weight  and  value  with  that  attached  to 
the  precepts  and  parables  of  our  Saviour,  or  (at  the  least) 
to  that  commonly  conceded  to  his  disciples  and  immediate 
followers.  We  add  some  of  their  peculiar  views.  Their  no 
tion  of  the  Trinity  differs  from  that  of  the  only  true  Church1: 
They  imagine  it  to  include  a  trinity  of  principles,  and  not  of 
persons  ;  the  principles  of  Love  and  Wisdom,  with  the  opera 
tion  of  both ;  or,  as  they  define  it,  an  intimate,  or  middle, 
and  an  ultimate  principle.  They  assert  the  non-existence  of 
a  Trinity  before  the  Incarnation  of  the  Word ;  that  then  it 


BWEDENBORGIANISM.  113 

arose  out  of  the  union  of  the  Divine  and  human  Natures, 
with  the  operation  of  both  ;  just  as  in  Man,  there  is  the  Soul, 
and  Body,  and  Life. 

Carrying  out  a  spirit  of  independent  inquiry,  they  also 
choose  to  differ  from  the  received  acceptation  of  the  Atone 
ment,  or,  as  they  quaintly  term  it,  at-one-ment.  They  deny 
that  God  the  Father  was  propitiated  by  the  VICARIOUS  suffer 
ing  of  God  the  Son ;  since,  on  the  ground  of  their  different 
notion  of  the  Divine  Trinity,  they  cannot  reconcile  the  idea 
to  their  minds.  (Vide  Barrett's  IX.  Lecture.)  Both  of  these 
most  important  heads  require  a  fuller  discussion  than  \ve  are 
theologians  enough  to  give,  or  than,  if  we  were,  we  have 
space,  in  this  rapid  outline,  to  include. 

In  this  desultory  notice,  we  do  not  pretend  to  preserve  any 
formality  of  method,  much  less  thoroughness  of  analysis,  but 
only  to  touch  on  the  most  striking  points.  One  of  these  is, 
the  presumption  of  speaking  of  a  peculiar  sect  (much  as  they 
avoid  the  name,  they  yet  form  a  sect),  as  the  A7ew  Church,  or 
the  NEW  JERUSALEM  ;  applying  the  phraseology  of  the  Ke- 
velations,  and  implying  a  degree  of  holiness  and  immaculate 
purity  in  its  members.  "Whatever  is  new,  we  might  remind 
these  sectaries,  is  not,  therefore,  true  ;  and  we  may  qu  -te  the 
remark  of  Sheridan,  of  a  popular  speaker,  that  of  what  lie 
said,  "  the  new  was  not  true,  and  the  true  not  new."  There 
is  much  elevated  sentiment  and  acute  metaphysical  reason 
ing  in  the  Swedenborgian  writers  ;  but  the  morality  is  the 
best  morality  of  the  New  Testament.  Better  there  is  none. 
Human  genius  cannot  improve  the  precepts  or  spiritual  teach 
ing  of  pure  Christianity  ;  and  human  invention  alters  only 
for  the  worse.  The  new  interpretation,  the  new  vouchers,  we 
hesitate  to  accept ;  nay,  more,  we  reject  them  altogether, 
whenever  they  contradict  the  old.  Mr.  Barrett  supposes,  like 


114  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

many  others,  most  unphilosophically  (as  it  appears  to  us), 
and  most  illogically,  by  an  entirely  false  analogy,   that  the 
ology  must  advance  with  the  physical  sciences.     We  find  the 
earliest  commentators  most  regarded,  and  for  many  dark  say 
ings  we  may  find  no  adequate  version.     Mystery  must  ever 
hang  over  portions   of  the  Holy   page.     What  is  essential 
to  be  known,  is  plain.     But  there  are   many  things  we  see 
"  through  a  glass  darkly,"  and  which,  we  are  reminded,   are 
to  be   seen  in  no  clearer  light,  while  an  earthly  film  over 
spreads  the  vision.    No  improved  theological  optics  can  make 
us  see  all  things  clearly,  until  our  eyes  (the  eyes  of  the  mind) 
are  touched  by  that  Divine  Hand  that  opened  the  eyes  of  the 
blind  Bartimeus.     Spiritual  truths  can  be  discerned  only  in  a 
spiritual  manner ;  and  we  cannot  now,  save  where  a  miracle 
is  granted,  see  with  a  pure  spiritual  vision.     All  the  aids  of 
critical  opticians,  when  conducted  in  a  wrong  spirit,   afford 
rather  optical  delusions  than  any  real  benefit.     We  are  truly 
told,  that  sensuality,  self-love,  worldliness,  and  pride,  so  be 
cloud  our  spiritual  perceptions,  as  to  prevent  our  recognising 
the  truth  as  it  is,  or  loving  it  as  we  should ;  and,  undoubted 
ly,  the  spirits  of  most  men  are  too  much  immersed  in  sense ; 
but  then,  no  refinement  of  spirituality  will  make  a  prophet 
out  of  every  ordinary  individual.     This  is  as   absurd  as  the 
notion  of  another  sect,  with  regard  to  speaking  the  Unknown 
Tongue,  which  is  equally  ridiculous  and  blasphemous ;  and 
means  a  dialect  that  none  can  controvert  to  be  what  it  pro 
fesses,  since  no  one  can  recognise  it.     The  followers  of  Swe- 
denborg  deny  this  mysticism  ;  but  it  is  palpably  evident  in  his 
life  and  habits  of  mind,  as  well  as  in  his  version  of  Scripture. 
He  taught  a  science  of  correspondencies  (we  see  no  good  rea 
son  for  prefixing  the  definite  article,  since  we   are  not  pre 
pared  to  receive  it) :  he  has  published  visions  of  the  word  of 


8WEDENBORGIANISM.  115 

spirits.  He  attempts  to  expound  the  mysteries  of  the  Book 
of  Revelations.  He  expressed  himself  by  symbol  and  alle 
gory.  His  style  is  an  imitation  of  the  Scriptures,  and,  like 
the  Book  of  Jasher,  reads  like  a  close  imitation.  This  style 
of  composition,  we  conceive,  by  an  uninspired  writer  (whose 
credentials  were  not  most  clear),  to  be  taking  a  most  repre 
hensible  and  audacious  liberty  with  the  Word  of  God. 

His  science  of  correspondencies,  which  it  is  pretended  was 
lost  by  Job,   and  only  revived  by  Svvedenborg  himself,   is  a 
species  of  figurative  allegory.     It  shows  acuteness  and  fancy  ; 
but  we  can  find  in  it  no  innate  force   compelling  the  convic 
tion  of  the  understanding.     It  is  also  singular  in  this  respect, 
that  it  translates  figurative   allegories  into  the  most  literal 
phraseology,  whilst  it  gives  a  symbolic  translation  to  the  sim 
ple  records  of  history.     Mr.  Barrett  speaks  thus  of  it :    u  The 
Science   of  Correspondencies,  as  revealed  in  the  writings  of 
Swedenborg,  furnishes  us  with  a  rule,  and  the  only  rule,  as 
we  have   before    said,  for  interpreting  aright  the  word  of 
God"     Yet  this  species   of  comment  and  translation  is  lull 
of  the   most  startling   assumptions.     It  denies  the  historical 
accuracy  of  Genesis,  defining  the  limits  of  true  history,  which 
is  declared  to  have  commenced   at  the  calling  of  Abraham. 
The  first  eleven  chapters  are  taken  as  one   continued  allego 
ry.     Adam  is  thought  to  typify  the  first  Church  :  the  Flood, 
to  mean  a  flood  of  ignorance  and  sin  over  the   moral  world. 
The  Waters  are  understood  as  truths  or  fables,  as  they  relate 
to  good  or  evil.     By  Noah,   and  the  creatures   preserved  in 
the  Ark,  are  rendered  the  preservation  of  good  principles  and 
sound  doctrine,  by  the  Divine  Providence.     All  this  is  very 
ingenious  and  plausible  ;  we  can  hardly  assign  it  a  worthier 
title.     Speculation  and  fancy  may  run  on,  in  this  manner,  ad 
libitum.     Purde  allegory,  on  the  other  hand,  is  construed 


116  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

into  an  exact  and  liberal  narrative  of  futurity — a  prophetic 
relation,  in  part  accomplished.  The  New  Jerusalem  is  local 
ized  ;  the  Judgment  Day  is  identified  with  a  past  epoch. 
Parat4e  is  considered  synonymous  with  matter  of  fact  his 
tory.  A  wise  man  often  discovers  the  most  wisdom  in  letting 
some  things  alone  ;  in  leaving  moot  points  at  rest.  Sweden- 
borg  could  not  abstain  from  a  rash  curiosity  of  gazing  upon 
the  Holy  of  Holies ;  he  must  needs  intrude  into  the  awful 
precincts  of  the  Apocalypse.  And  here  in  his  daring  rash 
ness,  he  evinced  equal  folly. 

His  visions,  and  publications  of  an  intercourse  with  the 
spiritual  world,  are  of  a  piece  with  the  rest.  It  is  painful  to 
see  the  state  into  which  that  man's  mind  must  have  fallen, 
who  could  write  out  such  accounts  as  we  find  in  Lecture  xii. 
(pages  415,41  G-4 1 8,  in  particular.)  We  are  almost  tempted 
to  exclaim, 

Lo !  what  a  noble  mind  was  here  o'erthrown ! 

Had  Swedenborg  lived  a  century  earlier,  he  would  have 
been  cited  as  a  memorable  instance  in  old  Burton's  chapter 
on  Religious  melancholy.  A  few  sentences  will  comprise  all 
the  criticism  on  the  Lectures  wo  have  to  offer.  Mr.  De 
Charms  is  the  clearest  writer :  Mr.  Barrett  is  more  ambitious 
and  flowery.  Both  are  sensible  thinkers,  yet  fall  into  gross 
blunders  whenever  they  attempt  to  exalt  their  Hero  and 
Master.  A  rather  presumptuous  parallel  is  here  drawn. 
"  We  would  therefore  beg  all  who  are  disposed  to  ridicule 
and  reject  the  writings  of  Swedenborg,  on  account  of  the 
alleged  visions  which  they  contain,  to  pause  and  consider, 
whether  they  do  not,  in  their  hearts,  if  not  with  their  lips, 
mock  at  the  views  of  the  Apostles  and  Prophets,  and  reject 


SWEDENBORGIANISM.  11 7 

the  Scriptures  as  a  revelation  from  God"  We  can,  by  no 
supposition,  conceive  how  a  rejection  of  Swedenborg's  mis 
sion,  invalidates  the  genuineness  of  the  Scriptures,  or  can  pre 
suppose  such  invalidation. 

The  followers  of  this  fanciful  theorist  (for  as  such,  in  the 
History  of  Religion,  the  character  of  Swedenborg,  we  sus 
pect,  will  finally  rest)  are,  in  the  majority  of  cases,  pure- 
minded  and  honest  men ;  in  some  cases  guided  by  a  poetical 
temperament  in  the  choice  of  a  religion  ;  in  others,  governed 
by  the  specious  "rationality"  of  the  Swedenborgian  scheme. 
Very  few  eminent  men  are  numbered  in  its  ranks.  Dr. 
Hartley,  the  metaphysician,  we  believe,  was  one  ;  Kant  ap 
pears  to  have  been,  and  Coleridge  was  for  a  while  attracted 
by  Swedenborgianism,  as  indeed  he  was  by  every  current 
fashionable  novelty,  and  curious  ancient  heresy.  American 
would-be  Coleridges  assume  the  doctrines,  as  a  fair  text  for 
imposing  rhetoric.  It  must  be  allowed,  as  we  have  admitted 
more  than  once,  that  parts  of  the  teachings  of  the  Swedish 
Apostle  are  imbued  with  the  loftiest  Christian  morality;  that 
his  spirit  bathed  in  an  atmosphere  of  the  purest  refinement; 
that  he  saw  keenly  into  much  of  the  spiritual  part  of  our 
nature.  Here  we  stop  in  our  eulogium.  As  a  moralist, 
Swedenborg  is  above  our  praise ;  as  a  religious  teacher,  a 
biblical  critic,  an  expounder  of  mysteries,  we  regard  him  as 
unsafe,  dangerous,  and  rash.  IJis  sect  is  still  very  small,  and 
its  polity  being  nearer  to  the  Congregational  form  of  Church 
government  than  to  any  other,  tends  continually  to  inde 
pendency,  and  disunion  among  its  members.  It  is  without 
an  abiding  principle  of  unity;  and  its  excessive  spirit  of 
liberty  is  liable  to  run  into  licentiousness  of  doctrine.  In 
Sweden  there  are  very  few  of  this  belief;  more  in  England 
and  on  the  continent.  In  this  country  they  have  several 


118  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

congregations  :  but  we  apprehend  no  stability  in  Sweden- 
borgianism  as  a  Church. ;  but  that  it  will  gradually  die  out 
like  the  Quakers  and  the  Unitarians.  Still,  the  Church  may 
derive  excellent  hints  from  some  of  the  strictures  of  Sweden- 
borg ;  and,  indeed,  from  more  than  one  of  the  spiritual 
Christian  philosophers  of  modern  Europe. 


XVI. 

RELIGIOUS    SATIRE. 

MANY  well-intentioned,  but  not  very  deep-thinking  people, 
are  mightily  frightened  by  anything  approaching  to  the  ar- 
gumentum  ad  absurdum,  in  matters  of  religion  or  morality. 
They  fancy  a  disrespect,  at  least,  if  not  a  secret  contempt  of 
Christianity  from  satirical  assaults  on  those  who  profess,  only 
to  disgrace  it.  They  apprehend  evil  from  the  air  of  levity 
with  which  such  subjects  are  treated ;  an  apprehension  rarely 
verified,  except  in  the  case  of  the  very  weak,  who  are  sure  to 
go  wrong  in  almost  every  possible  event.  No  man  but  a  fool 
or  a  radically  bad  character,  ever  could  conceive  of  universal 
hollowness,  because  there  were  many  demure  and  sly  hypo 
crites  in  the  world.  A  total  want  of  faith  is  the  unerring 
sign  of  a  temper  not  to  be  trusted ;  of  a  fickle  heart  and  a 
false  tongue.  But  satire  of  the  pretenders  to  true  religion 
is,  in  effect,  an  eulogy  of  the  sincerely  good  ;  indiscriminate 
praise  and  universal  censure  being  alike  in  this  respect,  that 
finally  they  tend  to  nothing,  as  they  nullify  each  other  by 


RELIGIOUS    SATIRE.  119 

opposite  extravagances.  It  is  true,  that  satirists  have  some 
times  transcended  the  proper  limits  of  truth  and  discretion  ; 
have  calumniated  where  they  should  have  calmly  censured  ; 
and  have  written  a  libel  instead  of  a  criticism.  The  most 
piquant  satire  is,  necessarily,  one-sided,  and  carried  to  the 
extreme  verge  of  truth  ;  at  times  overpassing  it.  Epigrams 
lose  in  point  where  they  approach  the  truth.  A  moderate 
thinker  is  rarely  to  be  found  among  professed  wits.  For, 
•when  a  man  comes  to  ponder  and  weigh  opposite  qualities 
and  conflicting  statements,  to  admit  this  excuse  and  allow 
that  apology,  when  circumstance  and  occasion  are  considered  ; 
and,  in  a  word,  when  he  endeavors  to  strike  a  just  balance  of 
the  actions  and  characters  of  men,  he  rarely  can  escape  a  trite 
conclusion  or  a  mediocrity  of  argument.  In  a  knowledge  of 
most  elementary  truths  and  general  propositions,  the  philoso 
pher  and  the  peasant  are  on  a  par;  the  difference  between 
them  consists  in  a  knowledge  of  the  intermediate  chain  of 
thought  and  reasoning  on  the  part  of  the  first,  and  ignorance 
in  the  case  of  the  last.  It  is  only  when  a  point  is  driven 
home,  when  to  paint  one  trait  vividly,  the  rest  of  the  features 
are  thrown  in  the  shade,  that  brilliancy  is  attained  at  the 
expense  of  fidelity  and  a  liberal  construction.  To  a  reader 
of  sense,  however,  a  defect  of  this  nature  makes  itself  appa 
rent  at  once,  and  he  sifts  out  the  false  from  the  fair :  to  all 
other  readers  it  matters  little,  for  they  might  misconstrue  the 
most  irreproachable  writer.  We  have  frequent  proof  that 
the  best  book  in  the  world  has  fared  the  worst  in  this  respect. 
Religious  satire  has  generally  been  directed  either  against 
the  extravagances  or  the  hypocrisy  of  reformers ;  and  when 
just  and  intelligent,  it  has  certainly  been  of  essential  service. 
It  may  not  benefit  the  immediate  objects  of  it.  It  may 
harden  or  dishearten  proselytes  and  late  converts,  re-changing 


120  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

the  self-styled  elect  into  viler  sinners  than  they  were  before ; 
but  it  is  productive  of  benefit  to  those  who  are  not  intimately 
connected  with  either  any  specific  reformation  itself  or  those 
conducting  it. 

The  very  idea  of  undertaking  to  convert  the  world,  at  the 
present  time  of  day,  discovers,  in  him  who  cherishes  it,  a 
palpable  defect  of  judgment  and  common  precaution,  and 
will  induce  compassion  where  it  does  not  provoke  ridicule. 
Such  innovators  appear  to  forget  how  much  benefit  may  be 
accomplished  by  the  thorough  performance  of  individual 
duties,  to  say  nothing  of  every  man's  natural  and  (as  it  were) 
hereditary  influence  in  his  own  walk  and  circle  of  society, 
which  may  be  turned  to  the  best  account  possible.  They 
leave  the  obvious  and  natural  claims  of  their  Maker,  their 
own  souls,  and  their  fellow-creatures,  for  the  vain  prosecution 
of  fantastic  projects.  Like  the  alchemist,  they  think  they 
possess  a  talisman,  unknown  to  all  others,  for  converting  sin 
ners  ;  a  talisman,  that  too  often  fails  in  its  pretended  effects 
when  employed  upon  themselves. 

To  say  that  no  good  has  accrued  to  society  from  zealous 
yet  prudential  reformation,  is  to  assert  what  is  palpably  false ; 
yet  to  conceal  the  great  evils  incurred  by  rash  innovation  and 
ignorant  fanaticism,  would  be  avoiding  a  fair  statement  of  the 
case.  The  greatest  of  Reformers,  Tune,  as  we  are  wisely 
taught  by  Bacon,  innovates  silently,  but  is  more  powerful 
than  any  other.  We  see  in  the  life  of  man,  how  age  reveals 
the  errors  of  youth,  and  manhood  suppresses  the  follies  of 
immaturity.  So  in  the  age  of  the  world,  civilization  and 
custom  must  unite  to  eradicate  (by  degrees)  the  defects,  the 
vices,  the  crimes  of  former  ages.  If  the  above  is  true  of 
matters  relating  to  the  civil  polity,  to  legislation  and  govern 
ment,  how  much  truer  is  it  with  regard  to  the  growth  and 


RELIGIOUS    SATIRE.  121 

very  existence  of  Christianity.  We  are  to  look  for  no  new 
lights  here ;  and  a  modern  Apostle  may  be  suspected  on 
prima  facie  evidence,  of  being  an  imposter.  The  assumption 
of  the  character  of  Founder  of  a  sect,  implies  a  degree  of 
pride  and  corresponding  want  of  humility,  hardly  consistent 
with  true  piety.  At  the  same  time,  it  evinces  rashness  and 
ignorance.  Modern  religious  reformers  generally  begin  by 
discrediting  the  labors  and  talent  of  previous  teachers,  in 
order  to  raise  the  value  of  their  own.  In  an  attempt  to  go 
back  to  the  standard  of  primitive  Christianity,  they  discredit 
the  succession  of  wise  and  good  men,  who  have  filled  the 
interval  with  their  pure  thoughts  and  holy  lives. 

In  effect,  too,  they  hurt  their  own  cause,  where  they  treat 
the  ministers  of  religion  with  contumely ;  for  they  destroy  a 
respect  for  those  external  decorums,  which  are  not  only  be 
coming  in  the  best  Christians,  but  considered  no  less  than 
essential  in  the  department  of  a  polished  gentleman. 

Enthusiasm  is,  at  once,  the  strong  and  the  weak  point  of 
the  religious  reformer,  enthusiasm,  real  or  assumed;  the  most 
vulnerable  point  of  attack. 

The  control  of  a  multitude  by  the  sympathetic  feeling  of 
enthusiasm  may  be  spoken  of  as  a  species  of  animal  or  spirit 
ual  magnetism.  We  see  the  effect  of  it  in  such  hands  as 
those  of  Mahomet,  Cromwell,  Whitfield,  Napoleon.  But 
this  is  a  vulgar  passion,  not  the  enthusiasm  of  noble  natures 
for  objects  of  equal  worth.  Ordinary  religious  enthusiasm  is 
both  degrading  and  impious ;  degrading  as  it  is  irrational, 
nud  impious  from  presumption  and  familiarity.  As  to  tho 
vulnerability  of  enthusiasm,  we  only  need  to  read  Iludibras. 
Yet  are  we  no  believers  in  the  sophism  of  u  ridicule  being  the 
test  of  truth."  It  may  furnish  a  searching  test  of  artificial 
manners.  It  is  a  touchstone  for  absurdities  in  conduct.  But 


122  CHARACTERS    AND   CRITICISMS. 

religion  is  above  it ;  its  principles  are  too  sacred  for  such  a 
connection.  The  practices  of  fanatic  religionists  are,  however, 
more  absurd  than  any  ridicule  that  can  be  heaped  upon  them, 
and  they  are  fair  game  for  the  pen  of  the  satirist. 

The  truest  Christians  have  been,  in  general,  moderate  in 
their  views,  no  advocates  of  human  perfectibility,  no  Fifth 
Monarchy  men.  Pious  persons,  with  a  vein  of  mysticism  in 
their  characters,  as  Norris,  Fenelon,  Herbert,  or  Farrar,  may 
indulge  themselves  in  raptures  and  ecstasies ;  but  these  have 
a  certain  real  beauty,  and  at  least  disturb  not  the  peace  of 
their  neighbors.  Modern  ranters  split  the  ears,  while  they 
would  invade  the  souls  of  the  groundlings,  and  seem  to  think 
the  kingdom  of  Satan  can  be  carried  by  the  same  means 
which  toppled  down  the  walls  of  Jericho. 

It  is  a  little  singular,  that,  with  a  single  exception,  the 
author  of  Hudibras,  the  keenest  satires  on  religious  extrava 
gances,  and  the  severest  censure  (however  humorously  alle 
gorized)  that  has  been  passed  on  the  defects  most  visible  in 
the  clerical  character,  should  have  come  from  the  pens  of 
churchmen.  Yet  such  has  been  the  case  from  the  time  of 
Erasmus  to  the  day  of  the  Rev.  Sidney  Smith,  the  most  cele 
brated  of  living  clerical  wits,  including,  among  other  names 
in  the  interval,  those  of  South,  Eachard,  and  Swift, — a  trio, 
that  for  wit,  sense,  and  honesty,  cannot  be  paralleled. 

Those  who  are  most  in  the  habit  of  railing  at  the  clergy 
and  at  religious  persons  in  general,  show  great  ignorance 
and  narrowness.  They  confound  the  worthy  with  the  worth 
less,  under  a  common  denomination  of  hypocrites.  It  is  a 
usual  saying  with  such  people,  that  they  consider  themselves 
as  good  Christians  as  any.  Having  seen  villany  and  world- 
liness  masked  under  the  appearance  of  religion,  they  conclude 
all  Christianity  to  be  a  deception.  This  is  as  much  as  if  one 


PROSE    OF    BARROW.  123 

should  pretend  an  accurate  knowledge  of  human  nature,  from 
having  filled  the  station  of  a  jailer  all  his  life,  and  seen  much 
crime.  The  Newgate  Calendar  is  but  a  chapter  in  the  great 
Book  of  Life.  Religious  satire  is  not  for  such  readers,  as  it 
gives  them  ideas  on  one  side,  and  that  the  worst  side,  which 
they  possess  neither  inclination  nor  ability  to  rebut.  Their 
situation  has  precluded  the  possibility  of  an  acquisition  of 
true  views  on  this  subject,  and  of  seeing  how  much  more 
good  than  eyil  there  is  in  the  world  after  all  (wicked  as  it 
is),  despite  the  sneers  of  the  profligate  and  the  scorn  of  the 
misanthrope. 


XVII. 

PROSE      OF      BARROW. 

THERE  is  an  eloquence  of  the  reason  as  well  as  of  the  ima 
gination  and  of  the  affections.  Perhaps  it  is  more  firmly 
based  than  either,  and  produces  in  the  end  the  surest  effects. 
It  is  less  captivating  than  the  descriptive  eloquence  of  Taylor  ; 
it  has  less  hold  on  the  taste  than  the  sentimental  passages  of 
Rousseau  or  Ilazlitt,  less  touching  than  the  pathos  of  Sterne 
or  Mackenzie,  less  brilliant  than  the  declamation  of  Burke  or 
Macaulay  :  but  it  is  anchored  in  truth  ;  it  is  founded  in  real 
ity  ;  it  convinces  the  understanding.  Finally,  all  eloquence 
must  come  to  this.  We  may  be  captivated  by  the  glittering 
flashes  of  a  copious  fancy,  and  charmed,  for  an  hour,  by  the 
attractive  graces  of  manner ;  but  the  only  true  eloquence  is 
that  which  is  always  such,  which  equally  interests  a  future 
age  and  a  foreign  nation,  and  which  is  the  pure  essence  of 


124  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

the  noblest  reason,  couched  in  the  clearest,  the  most  forcible, 
and  the  richest  expression.  Those  brilliant  contemporary 
speakers,  of  whom  we  have  only  a  traditionary  knowledge, 
such  as  Dean  Kirwan,  Patrick  Henry,  and  Emmett,  are 
rather  to  be  regarded  as  consummate  actors  than  solid 
orators. 

To  give  the  praise  of  finished  oratory  to  the  sermons  of 
Barrow  would  be  an  extravagance  of  eulogy ;  and  yet  his 
fame  is  great,  and  his  sermons  most  able.  He  possesses  the 
utmost  fulness  (this  side  of  extravagance)  in  point  of  thought 
and  expression ;  yet  we  can  hardly  say  as  much  of  his  style 
and  manner.  The  characteristic  trait  of  Barrow  is  his  power 
of  exhaustive  analysis.  He  is  a  perfect  mental  chemist,  ana 
lyzing  every  topic  into  as  many  parts  as  it  is  composed  of, 
and  precipitating  (so  to  speak)  all  the  falsehood  in  it,  leaving 
a  clear  solution  of  truth.  Our  divine  is  one  of  the  most 
liberal-minded  of  men.  He  has  a  wide  range  of  thought, 
and  mines,  as  it  were,  into  the  very  depth  of  his  argument. 
He  gives  you  every  side  of  every  subject  he  handles.  He 
knows  all  the  false  appearances  sophistry  may  be  made  to 
wear,  as  disguises  of  the  truth.  He  is  thoroughly  informed 
of  all  the  bearings  of  his  subject,  and  leaves  no  part  of  it  un 
touched.  Though  without  imagination,  Barrow  had  such  a 
fertility  of  intellect  (so  well  cultivated  was  the  soil),  as  to  ap 
pear  almost  possessing  invention  in  the  way  of  topics  and 
illustration.  The  secret  of  his ,  invention  lay  in  long  and 
severe  study,  aided  by  a  capacious  and  powerful  and  ready 
memory. 

Reason  was  the  master  faculty  of  Barrow's  mind.  He 
seems  to  have  had  but  little  fancy — no  imagination;  not 
much  of  an  eye  for  nature  —  no  humor  —  hardly  anything 
like  delicacy  of  sentiment.  His  understanding  was  a  robust, 


PROSE    OF    BARROYF.  125 

hard-working  faculty.  His  analysis  was  very  acute  and 
thorough  —  his  logic  exceeding  close,  searching,  and  patient. 
He  had  much  and  varied  erudition,  and  a  memory  that  was 
not  crushed  by  the  weight  of  it.  This  is  an  argument  for  the 
original  force  of  Barrow,  as  well  as  for  most  of  the  great  old 
prose-writers,  that  their  learning  was  not  too  much  for  them. 
No  foreign  acquisitions  could  obscure  the  clear  light  of  their 
own  reason :  learning  served  them  for  evidence,  for  illustra 
tion.  But  they  never  confounded  knowledge  and  wisdom, 
and  knew  as  well  as  the  old  dramatists,  their  grand  compeers 
that 

"  The  heart 
May  give  a  useful  lesson  to  the  head." 

Hence,  without  vanity,  they  relied  more  on  themselves  than 
most  scholars,  who  are  too  often  mere  pedants. 

It  is  worthy  of  remark,  that  most  of  Barrow's  sermons  are 
rather  moral  dissertations,  than  what  we  would  call,  at  the 
present  day,  evangelical  discourses.  Barrow  comes  nearer  to 
a  teacher  of  moral  philosophy,  than  the  ordinary  standard  of 
modern  preaching  will  allow.  It  was  his  practice  to  write  a 
series  of  sermons  on  certain  topics  of  practical  ethics  (none  the 
less  Christian,  though  some  would  have  us  think  so) ;  thus, 
he  has  four  sermons  on  industry,  eight  on  the  tongue,  &c.,  &c. 
He  seldom  wrote  less  than  two,  and  frequently  three,  on  a 
single  text.  These  are  complete  moral  treatises.  Though, 
in  one  sense,  this  may  bo  considered  a  defect,  yet,  in  our 
view  (perhaps  mistaken),  it  is  a  merit.  Preaching  too  often 
departs  from  the  themes  of  daily  importance  —  the  offices 
of  familiar  duty.  Most  congregations  require  to  bo  taught 
their  moral  as  well  as  their  religious  duties  (both  parts  of 
the  same  great  scheme,  and  essentially  one).  We  have 


126 


CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 


never  heard  the  orthodoxy  of  Barrow  questioned,  and  yet  it 
is  certain  he  is  more  of  a  moral  teacher  than  an  Evangelical 
Divine. 

There  is  a  palpable  defect  in  Barrow.  He  is  uniformly 
copious.  He  is  often  tedious.  He  is  too  apt  to  discuss  a 
trite  theme,  with  all  the  exuberance  of  power  he  employs  on 
one  less  familiar.  Moreover,  he  is  interminable.  Many 
laughable  anecdotes  are  related  of  his  power  of  continuance. 
Once,  at  a  charity  sermon,  he  detained  the  audience  by  a 
discourse  of  three  hours  and  a  half  in  length.  In  coming 
down  from  the  pulpit,  and  being  asked  if  he  felt  tired,  he 
replied  that  "  he  began  to  be  weary  with  standing  so  long." 
It  must  have  been  as  wearisome  for  the  audience  (we  should 
imagine)  to  sit  still  that  space  of  time,  unless  the  church  were 
a  dark  one,  the  cushions  soft,  and  the  pews  high.  On  another 
occasion,  being  reminded  that  the  congregation  at  the  Ab 
bey  liked  short  sermons,  he  was  prevailed  on  (with  much 
ado)  to  preach  but  one-half  of  his  original  sermon,  and  that 
occupied  an  hour  and  a  half. 

With  these  defects,  however,  that  must  have  rendered  him, 
to  light  hearers  of  the  Word,  a  rather  tiresome  preacher,  he 
is  still  a  right  sturdy,  manly  intellect  of  the  true  English 
breed. 

This  intellectual  robustness  was  joined  to  great  strength 
of  moral  purpose  and  determined  physical  courage.  Of  this 
last  quality,  two  remarkable  instances  occur  to  us.  Being 
attacked  at  night  by  a  powerful  mastiff,  he  grappled  with 
the  animal,  and  almost  choked  him,  before  any  assistance 
came.  At  sea,  in  the  Mediterranean,  the  vessel  in  which  he 
happened  to  be  embarked  was  attacked  by  an  Algerine  cor 
sair.  Barrow  could  not  be  prevailed  on  to  go  below,  but 
fought  bravely  with  the  crew. 


THE    POEMS    OF    BISHOP    CORBET.  127 

These  traits  of  character  cannot  fail  to  impress  us  with  the 
feeling  of  high  respect  for  Barrow's  force  and  energy. 

Though  no  wit,  to  bo  sure  in  his  sermons,  unless  a  strong 
sense  of  propriety  and  the  absence  of  it  can  be  termed 
wit,  yet  he  gave  Rochester  one  day  a  notable  reproof,  and 
foiled  that  courtly  wit  with  his  own  weapons.  And  Barrow 
penned  a  definition  of  wit,  amounting  to  an  essay,  which 
is  a  miracle  of  ingenuity  of  distinction  and  richness  of  ex 
pression. 

Charles  II.  used  to  call  Barrow  "  an  unfair  preacher,"  for 
he  left  nothing  for  future  preachers  to  glean  —  unless,  he 
might  have  added,  to  make  pretty  free  use  of  the  labors  of 
their  predecessors. 

Lord  Chatham  enjoined  on  his  son  the  constant  study 
of  Barrow,  and  Pitt  declared  he  had  his  sermons  almost  by 
heart. 

To  show  the  common  injudiciousness  of  parents  in  esti 
mating  the  talents  of  their  children,  the  father  of  Barrow  is 
said  to  have  exclaimed,  "  If  it  pleased  God  to  take  away  any 
of  his  children,  he  hoped  it  would  be  Isaak,"  regarding  him 
as  a  miracle  of  stupidity,  who  afterwards  proved  the  glory  of 
his  family. 


XVIII. 

THE    POEMS    OF    BISHOP    CORBET. 

IN  the  list  of  clerical  wits,  comprehending  some  of  the  best 
writers  of  England,  and  the  finest  satirical  humorists  in  the 
world,  (Fuller,  Earle,  South,  Eachard,  Swift,  Sterne,  and  Sid- 


128  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

ney  Smith,)  the  name  of  Corbet  should  always  find  a  place; 
yet  his  jeux  d* esprit  and  bon-mots  are  known  only  to  the  an 
tiquary  and  retrospective  critic.  His  poems  are  scattered  up 
and  down  a  variety  of  political  collections,  and  have  only  been 
brought  together  in  the  present  century.  His  modesty  would 
not  allow  the  public  acknowledgment  of  them  during  his  life, 
neither  would  he  suffer  any  of  his  sermons  to  be  printed, 
though  they  are  spoken  of  as  rarely  ingenious,  and  if  at  all 
answerable  to  his  conversation  and  verses,  they  must  have 
been  delicate.  The  best  account  we  can  gather  of  this  ec 
centric  wit,  we  find  in  Aubrey ;  and  it  is  one  of  the  most 
lively  sketches  in  his  collection.  We  transcribe  it  entire. 
"Richard  Corbet,  D.D.,  was  the  son  of  Vincent  Corbet,  (bet 
ter  known  '  by  Poynters  name  than  by  his  own'),  who  was  a 
gardener  at  Twickenham,  as  I  have  heard  my  old  cousen 
Whitney  say.  He  was  a  Westminster  scholar ;  old  Parson 
Bussey  of  Allscott,  in  Warwickshire,  went  to  school  with 
him  ;  he  would  say  he  was  a  very  handsome  man,  but  some 
thing  apt  to  abuse,  and  a  coward.  He  was  a  student  of 
Christ  Church,  in  Oxford.  He  was  very  facetious,  and  a 
good  fellow.  One  time  he  and  some  of  his  acquaintances  be 
ing  merry  at  Frayer  Bacon's  study  (where  was  good  beer 
sold),  they  were  drinking  on  the  leads  of  the  house,  and  one 
of  the  scholars  was  asleep,  and  had  a  pair  of  good  silk  stock 
ings  on:  Dr.  Corbet,  (then  M.A.,  if  not  B.D.,)  got  a  pair  of 
scissors  and  cut  them  full  of  little  holes ;  but  when  the  other 
awakened,  and  perceived  how  and  by  whom  he  had  been 
abused,  he  did  chastise  him,  and  made  him  pay  for  them. 

"  After  he  was  Doctor  of  Divinity,  he  sang  ballads  at  the 
Crosse  at  Abington,  on  a  market  day.  He  and  some  of  his 
camerades  were  at  the  taverne  by  the  Crosse,  (which,  by  the 
way,  was  then  the  finest  in  England  :  I  remember  it  when  I 


POEMS    OF    BISHOP    CORBET.  129 

was  a  freshman  :  it  was  admirable  curious  gothique  architec 
ture,  and  fine  figures  in  the  niches :  'twas  one  of  those  built 

by  King for  his  queen).     The  ballad  singer  complained 

he  had  no  custom,  he  could  not  put  off  his  ballads.  The 
jolly  Doctor  put  off  his  gown,  and  puts  on  the  ballad  singer's 
leathern  jockey;  and  being  a  handsome  man,  and  had  a  rare 
full  voice,  he  presently  vended  a  great  many,  and  had  a  full 
audience.  After  the  death  of  Dr.  Goodwin,  he  was  made  dean 
of  Christ  Church.  He  had  a  good  interest  with  great  men, 
as  you  may  find  in  his  poems,  and  with  the  then  great  favo 
rite,  the  D.  of  Bucks ;  his  excellent  wit  was  letter  of  recom 
mendation  to  him.  I  have  forgot  the  story,  but  at  the  same 
time  that  Dr.  Fell  thought  to  have  carried  it,  Dr.  Corbet  put  a 
pretty  trick  upon  him  to  let  him  take  a  journey  on  purpose  to 
London,  when  he  had  already  the  grant  of  it. 

"  He  preach't  a  sermon  before  the  King  at  Woodstock  (I 
suppose  King  James),  but  it  happened  that  he  was  out ;  on 
which  occasion  there  were  made  these  verses : 

A  reverend  deane, 

With  his  band  starch* d  cleane, 

Did  preach  before  the  King ; 
In  his  band  string  was  spied 
A  ring  that  was  tied, 

Was  not  that  a  pretty  thing? 

The  ring,  without  doubt, 
Was  the  thing  put  him  out, 

And  made  him  forget  what  was  next ; 
For  every  one  there 
Will  say,  I  dare  swear, 

That  he  handled  it  more  than  his  text. 


130  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

"  His  conversation  was  extreme  pleasant.  Dr.  Stubbins  was 
one  of  his  cronies ;  he  was  a  jolly  fat  Dr.,  and  a  very  good 
house-keeper.  As  Dr.  Corbet  and  he  were  riding  in  Lob- 
lane,  in  wet  weather  ('tis  an  ordinary  deep,  dirty  lane),  the 
coach  fell,  and  Dr.  Corbet  said  that  Dr.  Stubbins  was  up  to 
the  elbows  in  mire,  and  he  was  up  to  the  elbows  in  Stubbins. 
Anno  Domini  1628,  he  was  made  Bishop  of  Oxford,  and  I 
have  heard  that  he  had  an  admirable,  grave,  and  venerable 
aspect.  One  time  as  he  was  confirming,  the  country  people 
pressing  in  to  see  the  ceremony,  said  he,  '  Beare  off  there,  or 
Pll  confirme  ye  with  my  staff."1  Another  time,  being  to  lay 
his  hand  on  the  head  of  a  man  very  bald,  he  turned  to  his 
chaplain,  and  said,  *  Some  dust,  Lushingtorf  (to  keep  his 
hand  from  slipping).  There  was  a  man  with  a  great  venera 
ble  beard :  said  the  Bishop,  '  You,  behind  the  beard:  His 
chaplain,  Dr.  Lushington,  was  a  very  learned  and  ingenious 
man,  and  they  loved  one  another.  The  Bishop  sometimes 
would  take  the  key  of  the  wine  cellar,  and  he  and  his  chap 
lain  would  go  and  lock  themselves  in,  and  be  merry.  Then 
first  he  lays  down  his  episcopal  hat — '  There  lies  the  Dr.1 
Then  he  puts  off  his  gown — '  There  lies  the  Bishop?  Then 
'twas—'  Here's  to  thee,  Corbet]  and  '  Here's  to  thee,  Lushing- 

ion?  He  was  made  Bishop  of  Norwich, 

A.D.  1632.  His  last  words  were,  '  Good  night,  Lushing- 

ton>  His  poems  are  pure  natural  wit,  delightful 

and  easie." 

In  order  to  verify  this  criticism,  we  must  produce  some  spe 
cimens  of  his  talent  and  humorous  satire. 

Corbet's  poems  are  very  few,  and  half  of  those  indifferent ; 
but  the  rest  is  pure  gold.  His  forte  is  ironical  eulogy,  or  hu 
morous  ridicule.  Yet  he  has  natural  feeling,  as  shown  in  his 
Epitaphs.  A  certain  turn  for  Rabelaisian  jests  and  tricks, 


POEMS    OF    BISHOP    CORBET.  131 

with  an  occasional  palpable  hit  at  the  sectaries,  must  have 
made  him  an  episcopal  bugbear  to  the  Puritans  of  his  day. 
And  certainly  his  deportment,  at  times,  little  suited  the  dig 
nity  of  his  order.  But  he  flouted  at  dignities,  knowing  his 
manhood  to  be  much  superior  to  any  Bishopric.  He  was 
something  between  Archdeacon  Paley  and  the  Clerk  of  Cop- 
manhurst,  while  he  also  added  a  romantic  fancy  peculiar  to 
himself.  He  was  a  sincere  Christian,  a  reasonable  theologian, 
a  moderator,  a  wit,  a  good  fellow.  We  need  not  apprehend 
but  that  at  proper  times  he  bore  himself  like  a  brave  old 
bishop,  and  always  stood  erect  in  the  integrity  of  a  man. — 
His  journey  to  France  is  the  most  finished  of  his  sportive 
effusions. 

DR.  CORBET'S  JOURNEY  TO  FRANCE. 

I  went  from  England  into  France, 
Nor  yet  to  learn  to  cringe  or  dance, 

Nor  yet  to  ride  or  fence ; 
Nor  did  I  go  like  one  of  those 
That  do  return  with  half  a  nose 

They  carried  from  hence. 

But  I  to  Paris  rode  along, 
Much  like  John  Dory  in  the  song, 

Upon  a  holy  tide. 
I  on  an  ambling  nag  did  get, 
I  trust  he  is  not  paid  for  yet, 

And  spurr'J  him  on  each  side. 

And  to  St.  Dennis  fast  we  came, 
To  see  the  sights  of  Notre-Dame, 

The  man  that  shows  them  snaffles  ; 
Where  who  is  apt  for  to  believe, 
May  see  our  Ladies  right  arm  sleeve, 

And  eke  her  old  panto/les ; 


132  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

Her  breast,  her  milk,  her  very  gown 
That  she  did  wear  in  Bethlehem  town, 

When  in  the  inn  she  lay. 
Yet  all  the  world  knows  that's  a  fable, 
For  so  good  clothes  ne'er  lay  in  stable 

Upon  a  lock  of  hay. 

No  carpenter  could  by  his  trade, 
Gain  so  much  coin  as  to  have  made 

A  gown  of  so  rich  stuff. 
Yet  they,  poor  fools,  think  for  their  credit, 
They  may  believe  old  Joseph  did  it, 

'Cause  he  deserved  enough. 

There  ie  one  of  the  crosses  nails, 
"Which  whoso  sees  his  bonnet  vails, 

And  if  he  will  may  kneel. 
Some  say  'twas  false,  'twas  never  so, 
Yetj  feeling  it,  thus  much  I  know, 

It  is  as  true  as  steel. 


There  is  a  lanthorn  which  the  Jews, 
When  Judas  led  them  forth  did  use, 

It  weighs  my  weight  downright. 
But  to  believe  it  you  must  think 
The  Jews  did  put  a  candle  in't, 

And  then  'twas  very  light. 


There's  one  Saint  there  hath  lost  his  nose 
Another  's  head,  but  not  his  toes, 

His  elbow  and  his  thumb. 
But  when  that  we  had  seen  the  rags, 
We  went  to  th'  inn  and  took  our  nags, 

And  so  away  did  come. 


POEMS    OF    BISHOP    CORBET.  133 

Thus  wrote  our  merry  episcopal  satirist,  of  superstitious 
relics,  and  all  the  trumpery  of  the  Romish  Church.  The 
rest  of  the  poem  is  occupied  with  certain  exquisite  strokes  of 
local  satire,  and  a  fine  historical  portrait  of  Louis  XIIL,  truer 
than  most  historians  would  have  painted  it — and  in  far  finer 
style. 

Corbet  wrote  a  number  of  elegies,  though  his  vein  flowed 
more  after  the  manner  of  Sir  John  Suckling,  than  in  the 
style  of  the  tender  Tibullus.  The  elegy  upon  his  father's 
death  is  respectful  and  affectionate :  that  upon  Dr.  Donne, 
ingenius  and  well  turned  : 

AN    EPITAPH    ON    DR.   DONNE,    DEAN   OF   ST.    PAUI/S. 

He  that  would  write  an  Epitaph  for  thee, 
And  do  it  well,  must  first  begin  to  be 
Such  as  thou  wert ;  for  none  can  truly  know 
Thy  worth,  thy  life,  but  he  that  hath  liv'd  so. 
He  must  have  wit  to  spare,  and  to  hurl  down 
Enough  to  help  the  gallants  of  the  town ; 
He  must  have  learning  plenty,  best  the  laws, 
Civil  and  Common,  to  judge  any  cause ; 
Divinity,  great  store  above  the  rest, 
Not  of  the  last  edition,  but  the  best ; 
He  must  have  language,  travel,  all  thy  arts, 
Judgment  to  use,  or  else  he  wants  thy  parts  : 
He  must  have  friends,  the  highest,  able  to  do, 
Such  as  Maecenas,  and  Augustus,  too. 
He  must  have  such  a  sickness,  such  a  death, 
Or  else  his  vain  descriptions  come  beneath. 
Who  then  shall  write  an  Epitaph  for  thee, 
He  must  be  dead  first ;  let  t'  alone  for  me. 

Here  follow  two  lively  pieces,  having  the  form  of  Epi- 


134  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

taph,  but  with  more  of  a  satirical  than  of  an  elegiac  spirit  in 
them: 

TO   THE    GHOST   OF   ROBERT  WISDOME. 

Thou,  once  a  body,  but  now  aire, 
Arch  botcher  of  a  psalme  or  prayer, 

From  Carfax  come ; 
And  patch  me  up  a  zealous  lay, 
With  an  old  ever  and  ay, 

Or,  alt  and  some. 

Or  such  a  spirit  lend  mee, 

As  may  a  hymne  down  send  mee, 

To  purge  my  braine : 
So  Robert  look  behind  thee, 
Lest  Turk  or  Pope  doe  find  thee, 
And  goe  to  bed  againe. 

ON   THOMAS  JONCE. 

Here  for  the  nonce, 
Came  Thomas  Jonce, 

In  St.  Giles  Church  to  lie. 
None  Welsh  before, 
None  Welshman  more, 

Till  Shon  Clerk  die. 

I'll  toll  the  bell, 
I'll  ring  his  knell, 
He  died  well, 
He's  sav'd  from  hell ; 
And  so  farewell, 
Tom  Jonce. 

Our  last  extract  shall  been  in  a  different  strain  from  any 


THE  LADIES'  LIBRARY.  135 

of  the  foregoing.     It  is  a  poem  addressed  to  his  son  Vincent 
Corbet  on  his  birthday,  at  the  age  of  three  years. 

"What  I  shall  leave  thce,  none  can  tell, 

But  all  shall  say  I  wish  thee  well ; 

I  wish  thee,  Vin,  before  all  Wealth, 

Both  bodily  and  Ghostly  health  : 

Nor  too  much  wit,  nor  wealth,  come  to  thee, 

So  much  of  either  may  undo  thee. 

I  wish  thee  learning,  not  for  show, 

Enough  for  to  instruct  and  know  ; 

Not  such  as  gentlemen  require, 

To  prate  actable  or  at  fire. 

I  wish  thee  all  thy  mother's  graces, 

Thy  father's  fortunes,  and  his  places. 

I  wish  thee  friends,  and  one  at  court, 

Not  to  build  on,  but  support ; 

To  keep  .thee,  not  in  doing  many 

Oppressions,  but  from  suffering  any. 

I  wisli  thee  peace  in  all  thy  ways, 

Nor  lazy  nor  contentious  days  ; 

And  when  thy  soul  and  body  part, 

As  innocent  as  now  thou  art. 

Thus   much  from  merry,  wise,  and   kind-hearted  Bishop 
Corbet. 


XIX. 

THE  LADIES'  LIBRARY. 


THAT  admirable  manual  of  "  les  petitcs  morales,1"  and  even  of 
higher  matters  occasionally,  the  Spectator,  contains  a  paper 
which  we  hesitate  not  to  accept  as  a  just  specimen  of  contem- 


136 


CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 


porarj  satire  on  female  education  ;  we  refer  to  the  catalogue 
of  a  Ladies'  Library.     This  heterogeneous  collection  embraces 
heroical  romances  and  romancing  histories,  the  ranting  tra 
gedies  of  the  day,  with  the  libertine  comedies  of  the  same 
period.     In  a  word,  it  leads  us  to  infer  pretty  plainly  the  in 
significant  pretensions  the  gentlewoman  of  Queen  Anne's  day 
could  lay  to  anything  like  refinement  of  education,  or  even  a 
correct  propriety  in  dress  and  demeanor.     Tell  me  your  com 
pany,  and  I  will  disclose  your  own  character ;  speak  that  I 
may  know  you,  are  trite  maxims ;  but  give  me  a  list  of  your 
favorite  authors  is  by  no  means  so  common,  though  at  least 
as  true  a  test.     The  literary  and  indirectly  the  moral  depra 
vity  of  taste  exhibited  by  the  women  of  that  age,  is  easily  ac 
counted  for,  when  we  once  learn  the  fashionable  authors  and 
the  indifferent  countenance  given  to  any  authors  but  those  of 
the  most  frivolous  description.     The  queen  herself  was  an  il 
literate  woman,  and  we  are  told  never  once  had  the  curiosity 
to  look  into  the  classic  productions  of  Pope.     King  William, 
the  preceding  sovereign,  was  so  ignorant  of  books  and  the  li 
terary  character,  as  to  offer  Swift,  with  whom  he  had  been 
agreeably  prepossessed,  the  place  of  a  captain  of  a  regiment 
of  horse. 

Indulging  ourselves  in  a  rapid  transition,  we  pass  from  this 
era  to  the  epoch  of  Johnson  and  Burke,  and  Goldsmith  and 
Sheridan ;  we  come  to  the  reign  of  George  III.  Here  we 
find  the  scene  altered.  From  the  gay  saloon  we  are  dropped 
as  if  by  magic,  into  the  library  or  conversation  room.  We 
read  not  of  balls,  but  of  literary  dinners  and  assthetic  teas, 
and  we  meet  for  company,  not  thoughtless,  dressy  dames  of 
fashion  and  minions  of  the  goddess  of  pleasure,  but  grave, 
precise  professors  in  petticoats,  women  who  had  exchanged  a 
world  of  anxiety  for  the  turn  of  a  head-dress,  or  the  shape  of 


THE  LADIES'  LIBRARY.  137 

a  flounce  for  an  equally  wise  anxiety  about  the  philosophy  of 
education,  the  success  of  their  sonnets  and  tragedies,  and 
moral  tales  for  the  young.  The  pedantry  of  authorship  and 
dogmatic  conversation  superseded  the  more  harmless  pe 
dantry  of  dress.  Then  we  read  of  the  stupidest  company  in 
the  world,  which  arrogated  to  itself  the  claim  of  being  the 
best.  A  race  of  learned  ladies  arose  ;  bas-bleus,  the  Mon 
tagues,  the  Mores,  the  Sewards,  the  Chapones,  patronised  by 
such  prosing  old  formalists  as  Doctors  Gregory  and  Aiken, 
and  even  by  one  man  of  vigorous  talent,  Johnson,  and  one 
man  of  real  genius,  Richardson.  The  last  two  endured  much, 
because  they  were  flattered  much. 

When  we  speak  thus  contemptuously  of  learned  ladies,  we 
intend  to  express  a  disgust  at  the  pretensions  of  that  name. 
Genuine  learning  can  never  be  despised,  whoever  may  be  its 
possessor;  but  of  genuine  learning  it  is  not  harsh  to  suspect 
a  considerable  deficiency  where  there  is  so  much  of  display  and 
anxious  rivalry.  Where  the  learning  is  exact  and  solid,  it  is 
to  bo  remembered  that  many  departments  are  utterly  un- 
suited  to  the  female  mind ;  where,  at  best,  little  can  be  ac 
complished,  and  that  of  a  harsh  repulsive  nature.  We  want 
no  Daciers,  no  Somervilles,  no  Marcets,  but  give  us  an  you 
will  as  many  Inchbalds,  Burneys,  Edgeworths,  Miss  Barretts, 
as  can  he  had  for  love  or  money. 

We  believe  the  question  as  to  the  relative  sexual  distinc 
tions  of  intellectual  character,  is  now  generally  considered  as 
settled.  There  is  allowed  to  be  a  species  of  genius  essentially 
feminine.  Equality  is  no  more  arrogated  than  superiority  of 
ability,  and  it  would  bo  as  wisely  arrogated.  The  most  li 
mited  observation  of  life  and  the  most  superficial  acquaintance 
with  books,  must  effectually  demonstrate  the  superior  capa 
city  of  man  for  the  great  works  of  life  and  speculation.  It  is 


138  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

true,  great  geniuses  are  rare  and  seldom  needed,  and  the 
generality  of  women  rank  on  a  par  with  the  generality  of 
men.  In  many  cases,  women  of  talent  surpass  men  of  an 
equal  calibre  of  mere  talent,  through  other  and  constitutional 
causes — a  greater  facility  of  receiving  and  transmitting  im 
pressions,  greater  instinctive  subtlety  of  apprehension,  and  a 
livelier  sympathy.  We  cordially  admit  that  female  intellect, 
in  the  ordinary  concerns  of  life  and  the  current  passages  of 
society,  has  often  the  advantage  of  the  masculine  understand 
ing.  Cleverness  outshines  solid  ability,  and  a  smart  woman 
is  much  more  showy  than  a  profound  man.  In  certain  walks 
of  authorship,  too,  women  are  preeminently  successful :  in 
easy  narrative  of  real  or  fictitious  events  (in  the  last  implying 
a  strain  of  ready  invention),  in  lively  descriptions  of  natural 
beauty  or  artificial  manners ;  in  the  development  of  the 
milder  sentiment  of  love ;  in  airy,  comic  ridicule.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  highest  attempts  of  women  in  poetry  have 
uniformly  failed.  We  have  read  of  no  female  epic  of  even  a 
respectable  rank  ;  those  who  have  written  tragedies,  have 
written  moral  lectures  (of  an  inferior  sort)  like  Hannah  More ; 
or  anatomies  of  the  passions,  direct  and  formal,  like  Joanna 
Baillie  ;  or  an  historical  sketch,  as  Kienzi.  We  are  apt  to 
suspect  that  the  personal  charms  of  Sappho  prove  too  much 
for  the  admirers  of  her  poetic  rhapsodies,  otherwise  Longinus 
has  done  her  foul  injustice  ;  for  the  fragment  he  quotes  is  to 
be  praised  and  censured  chiefly  for  its  obscurity.  This  would 
have  been  a  great  merit  in  Lycophron. 

In  the  volume  of  British  Poetesses,  edited  by  Mr.  Dyce, 
it  is  astonishing  to  find  how  little  real  poetry  he  has  been 
able  to  collect  out  of  the  writings  of  near  a  century  of  authors 
scattered  over  the  surface  of  five  or  six  centuries.  It  must  be 
allowed  that  some  of  the  finest  short  pieces  by  female  writers 


THE  LADIES'  LIBRARY.  139 

have  appeared  since  the  publication  of  that  selection.  In  the 
volume  referred  to,  much  sensible  verse  and  some  sprightly 
copies  of  verse  occur ;  a  fair  share  of  pure  reflective  sentiment, 
delivered  in  pleasing  language  rarely  rising  above  correct 
ness  ;  of  high  genius  there  is  not  a  particle, — no  pretensions 
to  sublimity  or  fervor.  The  best  piece  and  the  finest  poem 
we  think,  is  the  charming  poem  of  Auld  Robin  Gray.  That 
is  a  genuine  bit  of  true  poesy,  and  perfect  in  the  highest  de 
partment  of  the  female  imagination,  in  the  pathos  of  domestic 
tragedy.  In  the  present  century  we  have  Mrs.  Hemans,  Mrs. 
Howitt  and  Mrs.  Southey,  but  chief  of  all,  Miss  Barrett.  The 
finest  attempts  of  the  most  pleasing  writers  of  this  class, 
always  excepting  the  noble  productions  of  the  last  named 
poetess,  do  not  rise  so  high  as  the  delightful  ballad  above 
named.  They  are  sweet,  plaintive,  moral  strains,  the  melo 
dious  notes  of  a  lute,  tuned  by  taper  fingers  in  a  romantic 
bower,  not  the  deep,  majestic,  awful  tones  of  the  great  organ, 
or  the  spirited  and  stirring  blasts  of  the  trumpet.  The  ancient 
bard  struck  wild  and  mournful,  or  hearty  and  vigorous  notes 
from  his  harp — perchance  placed  "  on  a  rock  whose  frowning 
brow,"  &c.,  and  striving  with  the  rough  symphonies  of  the 
tempest :  but  the  sybil  of  modern  days  plays  elegant  and 
pretty,  or  soft  and  tender  airs  upon  the  flageolet  or  accordion, 
in  the  boudoir  or  saloon. 

A  poet  is,  from  the  laws  both  of  physiology  and  philology 
— masculine.  Ilis  vocation  is  manly,  or  rather  divine.  And 
we  have  never  heard  any  traits  of  feminine  character  attri 
buted  to  the  great  poet  (in  the  Greek  sense),  the  Creator  of 
the  universe.  The  muses  are  represented  as  females,  but  then 
they  are  the  inspirers,  never  the  composers,  of  verse.  Women 
should  be  the  poet's  muse,  as  she  is  often  the  poet's  theme. 
Let  female  beauty  then  sit  for  her  portrait  instead  of  being 


140  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

the  painter.  Let  poets  chaunt  her  charms,  but  let  her  not 
spoil  a  fair  ideal  image  by  writing  bad  verses.  If  all  were 
rightly  viewed,  a  happy  home  would  seem  preferable  to  a 
seat  on  Parnassus,  and  the  Fountain  of  Content  would  fur 
nish  more  palatable  draughts  than  the  Font  of  Helicon.  The 
quiet  home  is  not  always  the  muses'  bower ;  though  we  trust 
the  muses'  bower  is  placed  in  no  turbulent  society. 

Women  write  for  women.  They  may  entertain,  but  can 
not,  from  the  nature  of  the  case,  become  instructors  of  men. 
They  know  far  less  of  life ;  their  circle  of  experience  is  con 
fined.  They  are  unfitted  for  many  paths  of  active  exertion, 
and  consequently  are  rendered  incapable  of  forming  just 
opinions  on  many  matters.  We  do  not  include  a  natural  in 
capacity  for  many  studies,  and  as  natural  a  dislike  for  many 
more.  Many  kinds  of  learning,  and  many  actual  necessary 
pursuits  and  practices,  it  is  deemed  improper  for  a  refined 
woman  to  know.  How,  then,  can  a  female  author  become  a 
teacher  of  man  ? 

Literature  would  miss  many  pleasant  associations  if  the 
names  of  the  best  female  writers  were  expunged  from  a  list 
of  classic  authors,  and  the  world  would  lose  many  delightful 
works — the  novel  of  sentiment  and  the  novel  of  manners, 
letter-writers,  moral  tales  for  children,  books  of  travels,  gos- 
sipping  memoirs — Mrs.  Inchbald,  Madame  D'Arblay,  Miss 
Edgeworth,  Lady  M.  W.  Montague,  Miss  Martineau,  and 
Miss  Sedgwick,  with  a  host  besides.  Women  have  sprightli- 
ness,  cleverness,  smartness,  though  but  little  wit.  There  is 
a  body  and  substance  in  true  wit,  with  a  reflectiveness  rarely 
found  apart  from  a  masculine  intellect.  In  all  English 
comedy,  we  recollect  but  two  female  writers  of  sterling  value 
— Mrs.  Centlivre  and  Mrs.  Cowley,  and  their  plays  are  formed 
on  the  Spanish  model,  and  made  up  of  incident  and  intrigue, 


THE  LADIES'  LIBRARY.  141 

much  more  than  of  fine  repartees  or  brilliant  dialogue.  We 
know  of  no  one  writer  of  the  other  sex,  that  has  a  high 
character  for  humor — no  Rabelais,  no  Sterne,  no  Swift,  no 
Goldsmith,  no  Dickens,  no  Irving.  The  female  character 
does  not  admit  it. 

Women  cannot  write  history.  It  requires  too  great  soli 
dity,  and  too  minute  research  for  their  quick  intellects. 
They  write,  instead,  delightful  memoirs.  Who,  but  an  an 
tiquary  or  historical  commentator,  would  not  rather  read 
Lucy  Hutchinson's  Life  of  her  Ilusband,  than  any  of  the  pro 
fessed  histories  of  the  Commonwealth — and  exchange  Lady 
Fanshawe  for  the  other  royalist  biographers  ? 

Neither  are  women  to  turn  politicians  or  orators.  We 
hope  never  to  hear  of  a  female  Burko  ;  she  would  be  an 
overbearing  termagant.  A  species  of  a  talent  for  scolding, 
is  the  highest  form  of  eloquence  we  can  conscientiously  allow 
the  ladies. 

Women  feel  more  than  they  think,  and  (sometimes)  say 
more  than  they  do/  They  are  consequently  better  adapted 
to  describe  sentiments,  than  to  speculate  on  causes  and  effects. 
They  are  more  at  home  in  writing  letters,  than  tracts  on 
political  economy. 

The  proper  faculties  in  women  to  cultivate  most  assidu 
ously  are,  the  taste  and  the  religious  sentiment ;  the  first,  as 
the  leading  trait  of  the  intellectual ;  and  the  last,  as  the 
governing  power  of  the  moral  constitution.  Give  a  woman  a 
pure  taste  and  high  principles,  and  she  is  safe  from  the  arts 
of  the  wiliest  libertine.  Let  her  have  all  other  gifts  but 
these,  and  she  is  comparatively  defenceless.  Taste  purifies 
the  heart  as  well  as  the  head,  and  religion  strengthens  both. 
The  strongest  propensities  to  pleasure  are  not  so  often  the 
means  of  disgrace  and  ruin  as  the  carelessness  of  ignorant 


142  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

virtue,  and  an  unenlightened  moral  sense.  This  makes  all 
the  difference  in  the  world,  between  the  daughter  of  a  poor 
countryman,  and  the  child  of  an  educated  gentleman.  Both 
have  the  same  desires,  but  how  differently  directed  and  con 
trolled.  Yet  we  find  many  lapses  from  virtue  in  the  one 
case,  where  we  find  one  in  the  other. 

Believing  that  what  does  not  interest,  does  not  benefit  the 
mind,  we  would  avoid  all  pedantic  lectures  to  women,  on  all 
subjects  to  which  they  discover  any  aversion.  Study  should 
be  made  a  pleasure,  and  reading  pure  recreation.  In  a 
general  sense,  we  would  say  the  best  works  for  female  readers 
are  those  that  tend  to  form  the  highest  domestic  character. 
Works  of  the  highest  imagination,  as  being  above  that  con 
dition,  and  scientific  authors,  who  address  a  different  class  of 
faculties,  are  both  unsuitable.  An  admirable  wife  may  not 
relish  the  sublimity  of  Milton  or  Hamlet ;  and  a  charming 
companion  be  ignorant  of  the  existence  of  such  a  science  as 
Algebra.  A  superficial  acquaintance  with  the  elements  of 
the  physical  sciences  is  worse  than  total'unacquaintance  with 
them. 

Religion  should  be  taught  as  a  sentiment,  not  as  an  abstract 
principle,  or  in  doctrinal  positions,  a  sentiment  of  love  and 
grateful  obedience  ;  morality  impressed  as  the  practical  exer 
cise  of  self-denial  and  active  benevolence.  In  courses  of 
reading,  too  much  is  laid  down  of  a  dry  nature.  Girls  are 
disgusted  with  tedious  accounts  of  battles  and  negotiations, 
dates  and  names.  The  moral  should  be  educed  best  fitted 
for  the  female  heart,  and  from  the  romantic  periods,  and  the 
reigns  of  female  sovereigns,  or  epochs  when  women  held  a 
very  prominent  place  in  the  state,  or  in  public  regard.  We 
would  have  women  affectionate  wives,  obedient  daughters, 
agreeable  companions,  skilful  economists,  judicious  friends ; 


IARLY    MATURITY    OF    GENIUS.  143 

but  we  must  confess  it  does  not  fall  within  our  scheme  to 
make  them  legislators  or  lawyers,  diplomatists  or  politicians. 
We  therefore  think  nine-tenths  of  all  history  is  absolutely 
useless  for  all  women.  Too  many  really  good  biographies  of 
great  and  good  men  and  women  can  hardly  be  read,  and 
•will  be  read  to  much  greater  advantage  than  histories, 
as  they  leave  a  definite  and  individual  impression.  The 
reading  good  books  of  travels  is,  next  to  going  over  the 
ground  in  person,  the  best  method  of  studying  geography, 
grammar  and  rhetoric  (the  benefit  flowing  from  these  studies 
is  chiefly  of  a  negative  character),  after  a  clear  state 
ment  of  the  elementary  rules)  are  best  learnt  in  the  perusal 
of  classic  authors,  the  essayists,  &c  ;  and,  in  the  same  way, 
the  theory  of  taste  and  the  arts.  The  most  important 
of  accomplishments  is  not  systematically  treated  in  any  sys 
tem — conversation.  But  a  father  and  mother,  of  education, 
can  teach  this  better  than  any  professor.  Expensive  schools 
turn  out  half-trained  pupils.  Eight  years  at  home,  well  em 
ployed,  and  two  at  a  good  but  not  fashionable  school,  are 
better  than  ten  years  spent  in  the  most  popular  female 
seminary,  conducted  in  the  ordinary  style. 


XX. 

THE  EARLY  MATURITY  OF  GENIUS.  * 

M«n  of  quick  imaginations,  ceteria  pnribus  are  more  prudent  than  those  whose 
imaginations  are  slow,  for  .they  observe  more  in  less  time.— Holbev'  Treatise  of 
Human  Nature. 

It  is  perhaps  worth  remarking  that  the  Principles  of  Human  Knotdedfje  were 
published  in  1710,  at  a  time  when  the  author  was  only  Uve-and-twenty,  as  was 

*  1844. 


144  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

The  Essay  on  Vision^  the  greatest  by  far  of  all  his  works,  and  the  most  complete 
example  of  elaborate  analytical  reasoning  and  particular  induction  joined  together, 
that  perhaps  ever  existed.  *  *  *  *  I  mention  this  the  more  because  I 
believe  that  the  greatest  efforts  of  intellect  have  almost  always  been  made  while 
the  passions  are  in  their  greatest  vigor  and  before  hope  loses  its  hold  on  the  heart, 
and  is  the  elastic  spring  which  animates  all  our  thoughts. — Hazlitt — Literary  Re 
mains — Lecture  on  Locke's  Essay*. 

WE  design  the  present  article  rather  as  a  sketch  of  literary 
statistics,  a  table  of  instances,  to  illustrate  the  general  prin 
ciple  we  aim  to  establish,  than  as  anything  like  a  complete 
survey  or  accurate  digest  of  the  subject  which  it  would  re 
quire  a  volume  to  contain.  We  consider  the  fact  as  having 
an  historical  basis,  as  founded  in  the  history  of  letters,  that 
true  genius  comes  to  maturity  much  sooner  than  is  generally 
supposed.  In  a  word,  we  have  merely  collected  a  number  of 
witnesses  to  confirm  the  maxim  stated  by  Steele,  though  in 
a  rather  restricted  form.  It  occurs  in  a  paper  of  the  Lover, 
number  twenty-two :  "  I  am  apt  to  think  that  before  thirty, 
a  man's  natural  and  acquired  parts  are  at  that  strength,  with 
a  little  experience,  to  enable  him  (if  he  can  be  enabled)  to 
acquit  himself  well  in  any  business  or  conversation  he  shall 
be  admitted  to." 

The  vulgar  error  is  to  rate  the  growth  of  the  individual 
intellect  of  the  original  with  the  ordinary  progress  of  "  the 
common  mind ;"  to  measure  the  giant  by  the  common  stand 
ard  of  human  stature.  This  is  evidently  absurd.  Yet  no 
error  is  so  common  as  to  attempt  to  depress  cleverness  by 
sneers  at  the  youthful  age  of  the  aspirant,  like  the  taunts  of 
Walpole  directed  against  Pitt,  and  like  those  of  every  dull 
man,  of  middle  age,  who  has  a  fixed  position  (beyond  which 
he  is  not  likely  to  rise),  at  those  who  are  evidently  fast  rising 
above  him.  No  young  man  of  talent,  but  has  had  enemies 
such  as  these  to  encounter ;  men  who  seem  to  take  a  fiendish 


EARLY    MATURITY    OF    GENIUS.  145 

and  cherish  a  malicious  pleasure  in  seeking  to  depress 
everything  like  genuine  enthusiasm  and  the  buoyant  am 
bition  of  the  bright  boy  or  the  brilliant  young  man.  This 
arises  half  the  time  from  sheer  malice,  and  as  often  from  pure 
ignorance  of  the  nature  and  temperament  of  genius.  When  the 
"  climber  upward"  has  gained  his  place  among  his  peers,  then 
these  miserable  flatterers  cringe  and  fawn  as  basely  as  they 
formerly  maligned  and  ridiculed  him ;  and  would  fain  crowd 
out  of  sight  his  old  friends  and  staunch  adherents.  In  his 
green  age  and  budding  season  the  youth  of  genius  craves 
and  requires  sympathy.  It  is  with  him,  especially  (and,  in  a 
measure,  with  all  men,)  an  intellectual  want,  as  evident  as 
the  coarsest  necessary  elements  of  existence. 

By  early  maturity  of  genius,  we  mean  no  prodigies  of 
childish  or  boyish  talent — such  we  always  distrust,  as  un 
healthy  prematureness,  generally  resulting  in  a,  feeble  man 
hood.  Wonderful  boys  are  almost  always  dull  men.  No 
particular  point  of  time  can  be  fixed,  but  manly  intellects  are 
at  their  maturity  somewhere  between  twenty-five  and  thirty  ; 
and  in  good  constitutions,  this  vigor  and  freshness  remain 
sometimes  to  a  great  age.  Youth  is  a  heavy  charge  to  lay 
against  any  writer,  yet  one  becoming  daily  of  less  weight. 
Surely  it  is  a  season  which  furnishes  qualities  and  feelings 
not  to  be  expected  in  later  life,  and  at  least  to  be  cherished 
for  that  reason.  To  the  contemners  of  youthful  genius,  we 
would  reply,  in  the  words  of  the  admirable  Cowley,  himself 
an  example  of  precocity  of  talent :  "  It  is  a  ridiculous  folly  to 
laugh  at  the  stars  because  the  moon  and  the  sun  shine 
brighter."  Let  every  captious  critic,  also,  read  Bacon's  ex 
quisite  essay  on  "  Youth  and  Age,"  in  which  he  will  find 
the  truest  justice  allotted  to  each  period  of  this  our  mortal 
life. 

7 


146  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

The  majority  of  true  poets  have,  as  a  general  rule,  pro 
duced  their  best  works  at  a  very  early  age,  comparatively. 
A  very  few  distinguished  instances,  on  the  other  side  of  the 
question,  cannot  affect  the  principle  we  aim  to  establish,  but 
rather  by  especial  inference,  as  they  furnish  the  exception, 
so  far  they  go  to  establish  the  general  maxim.  Youth  is 
naturally  the  season  of  enjoyment,  and  genial  enjoyment  as 
naturally  gives  birth  to  the  sweetest,  the  most  cordial,  the 
delicatest  strains  of  the  muse.  Yet  we  do  not  mean  by  youth 
the  season  of  childhood,  or  boyhood,  but  the  period  of  mature 
adolescence,  from  twenty-four  to  thirty.  Very  many  fine 
poets  have  actually  done  their  best  before  even  this  epoch  ; 
and  all  who  have  ever  become  eminent  for  the  exercise  of 
the  imaginative  faculty,  have  discovered  some  signs  at  least 
of  its  existence  while  in  their  teens  :  a  very  small  number  of 
great  names  being  excluded.  In  a  list  of  the  classic  English 
poets,  we  find  but  rare  examples  of  late  poetical  genius ; 
Chaucer,  Dryden,  Young,  Johnson,  Cowper,  Milton,  who 
composed  Paradise  Lost,  about  middle  life,  yet  wrote  Comus 
at  the  age  of  twenty-six,  when  it  was  first  performed  as  a 
Masque,  at  Ludlow  castle,  in  Wales.  In  the  drama,  where 
one  might  justly  admit  a  late  development  of  poetical  power, 
inasmuch  as  that  department  of  poetry  demands  more  and 
more  cultivated  faculties  than  any  other :  even  in  comedy, 
requiring  a  close  observation  of  manners,  and  a  keen  insight 
into  character,  we  still  find  the  capital  writers  producing  their 
master-pieces,  while  other  men  are  hardly  fitted  by  reading 
and  a  knowledge  of  life  even  to  criticise  them.  Thus,  Shaks- 
peare's  first  play  was  printed  in  his  twenty-seventh  year : 
Jonson's  Every  Man  in  his  Humor,  with  those  admirable 
portraits  of  the  braggadocio  in  Bobadil,  and  of  the  jealous 
husband,  in  Kitely,  was  written  in  his  twenty-second  year. 


EARLY    MATURITY    OF    GENIUS.  147 

The  last  play  of  Farquhar,  the  Recruiting  Officer,  appeared  a 
few  weeks  before  his  death,  which  occurred  when  he  was 
only  twenty-seven,  and  his  other  delightful  comedies  were 
produced  some  years  earlier.  Congreve's  Old  Bachelor  was 
the  fruit  of  his  college  years,  and  appeared  in  his  twenty- 
first  year.  The  masterpiece  of  English  comedy,  Love  for 
Love,  only  two  years  afterwards.  Sheridan's  Rivals,  inferior 
only  to  the  School  for  Scandal,  was  performed  in  his  twenty- 
fourth  year.  The  first  fruits  of  Goethe  and  Schiller's  dramatic 
genius  (unlike  those  of  the  other  writers  we  have  quoted,  in 
not  being  by  any  means  their  best,  yet  as  evincing  power 
and  future  dramatic  skill),  Goetz  of  Berlinchen,  and  the 
Robbers,  at  the  respective  ages  of  twenty-two  and  twenty- 
one.  Sheridan  Knowles,  the  earliest  of  living  English  Dra 
matists,  is  the  last  instance  we  remember  of  early  dramatic 
genius. 

In  prose  fiction,  requiring  at  least  equal  knowledge  of 
character  and  manners,  with  comedy — we  have  Roderick 
Random,  perhaps  Smollett's  best  work,  at  twenty-seven,  and 
the  Man  of  Feeling,  at  twenty-six.  Fielding,  Sterne,  and 
Richardson  were  later.  But  in  the  present  century,  Hood, 
Hook,  and  Dickens,  unquestionably  wrote  their  best  works 
earliest. 

Among  the  miscellaneous  poets,  Hall's  first  and  last  vol 
ume  of  poetry,  full  of  vigor  and  mature  knowledge  of  life, 
was  published  in  his  twenty-third  year.  Warton  admits 
that  Donne's  best  poetry  was  written  before  the  age  of 
twenty-five.  Sir  John  Suckling  died  at  twenty-eight.  Cow- 
ley  is  generally  considered  precocious  :  his  first  volume  ap 
peared  when  he  was  a  boy  of  thirteen.  But  his  best  poetry 
was  the  growth  of  his  later  years.  Pope's  Ode  to  Solitude 
is  often  referred  to.  He  was  twelve  years  old  when  he 


148  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

wrote  it :  a  greater  miracle  was  his  producing  such  a  body 
of  acute  criticism,  as  his  famous  Essay  on  Criticism  displays, 
when  he  was  but  twenty-one.  Akenside's  chief  work,  the 
Pleasures  of  the  Imagination,  at  twenty-three.  Collins's 
noble  odes  were  written  at  twenty-six.  Burns's  first  volume 
was  first  printed  when  the  poet  was  twenty-eight ;  under 
favorable  influences,  his  genius  had  undoubtedly  blossomed 
much  sooner.  Classic  English  poetry  in  this  nineteenth  cen 
tury  has  been  written  by  young  poets,  and  even  the  master 
of  them  all,  still  living,  wrote  his  characteristic  pieces  quite 
early.  Wordsworth's  first  volume  came  out  at  the  age  of 
twenty-three  ;  the  Pleasures  of  Hope  at  twent-one  :  the  won 
derful  Ancient  Mariner,  in  which  some  critics  can  see  nothing 
was  written  at  twenty-four ;  Byron's  second  canto  of  Childe 
Harold,  at  twenty-four.  Of  contemporary  English  poets,  we 
believe  all  of  them  without  exception  produced  their  finest 
things  at  a  very  early  age — Proctor,  Moore,  Hunt,  Tennyson, 
Miss  Barrett,  Hood,  and  a  brilliant  galaxy  of  smaller  stars. 
Two,  perhaps,  in  their  separate  walks,  the  finest  poets  of  this 
century  (Goethe,  Schiller,  and  Wordsworth  excepted),  died 
very  early ;  Shelley  at  thirty,  and  Keats  at  twenty -four. 
We  reserve  a  page  for  American  Bards,  in  conclusion,  when 
we  come  to  speak  of  American  Literature,  and  of  this  very 
striking  feature  in  it  of  the  early  age  at  which  our  finest 
writers  have  done  their  best  things,  and  of  an  equally  singu 
lar  trait,  discernible  in  the  fact,  that  after  a  comparatively 
early  period,  they  either  ceased  to  produce  or  fell  off  very 
considerably.  Meantime,  we  notice  a  fact  as  remarkable  as 
the  early  maturity  of  genius,  i.  e.,  of  the  creative  power,  in 
imaginative  productions,  in  the  history  of  those  eminent  for 
critical  and  speculative  ability.  The  first  and  greatest  critics, 
moralists,  and  prose  writers  performed,  what  we  are  apt  to 


EARLY    MATURITY    OF    GENIUS.  149 

conceive  a  still  greater  wonder,  in  exhibiting  at  so  youthful  a 
period,  uncommon  abilities,  in  departments  generally  con 
signed  to  the  man  of  tried  experience  and  mature  years ; 
some  of  the  greatest  monarchs  and  generals  the  world  has 
ever  seen  performed  feats  the  most  brilliant,  while  quite 
young  men.  It  is  only  necessary  to  refer  to  Alexander  the 
Great,  Crcsar,  the  first  Prince  of  Orange,  his  son  Maurice, 
William  III.  of  England,  Gustavus  Adolphns,  Eugene,  Marl- 
borough,  Peter  the  Great,  Charles  of  Sweden,  Washington, 
Napoleon,  and  Clive. 

There  is  a  genius  for  criticism,  for  metaphysical  investiga 
tion  and  politics,  as  well  as  for  poetry  or  any  of  the  arts.  We 
•will  select  our  illustrations  of  this  at  random.  Bacon,  at  thir 
teen,  entered  Cambridge  :  at  sixteen  wrote  against  the  Aris 
totelian  logic — at  nineteen  put  forth  a  pamphlet  on  the  exist 
ing  state  of  Europe:  at  twenty-six  (some  say  at  fifteen) 
planned  the  Novum  Organon.  Burke  wrote  his  Essay  on 
the  Sublime  and  Beautiful,  at  the  age  of  twenty-six.  Mac- 
aulay  has  remarked  a  wonderful  coincidence  (certainly  in 
itself  unaccountable,  yet  not  confined  to  those  two  admirable 
writers) ;  that  the  judgment  was  the  faculty  first  developed 
in  them,  but  that  fancy  came  much  later ;  that  at  middle 
age,  they  were  most  just  and  logical  and  comprehensive  in 
their  sober  speculations,  yet  then  also  just  in  the  dawn  of 
that  gorgeous  eloquence,  which  was  richest  in  their  latest 
works.  Hazlitt  furnishes  a  similar  instance.  His  first  work, 
on  the  Principles  of  Human  Action,  was  published  in  his 
twenty-fifth  year.  He  says  he  was  engaged  upon  it  for  eight 
years  ;  and  we  should  suspect  the  same  thing  from  internal 
evidence.  It  is  hard,  dry  and  jejune  :  yet  close  and  rigidly 
logical,  with,  as  Macintosh  thinks,  much  power  of  metaphy 
sical  speculation,  flow  different  is  this  from  his  Table-Talk 


150  CHARACTERS   AND    CRITICISMS. 

and  Plain  Speakers  and  Lectures :  abounding  not  only  in 
subtle  and  deep  thought,  but  picturesque,  rich,  eloquent  and 
glancing.  Brown's  Religio  Medici  was  the  work  of  his  twen 
ty-seventh  or  eighth  year.  Brown,  the  Scotch  metaphysi 
cian,  whose  later  style  was  flowery  to  excess,  and  even  effem 
inate  in  a  high  degree,  composed  a  Tract  on  Causation, 
which  at  once  gave  him  high  rank  as  a  metaphysician,  when 
he  had  not  reached  his  eighteenth  year.  The  elegant 
Hume's  first  philosophical  essays,  written  or  at  least  planned 
at  College,  were  published  at  twenty-six,  and  are  so  much 
less  readable  than  his  easy  historical  narration,  that  Hazlitt 
himself  designates  the  Treatise  on  Nature,  as  "  a  metaphysi 
cal  chokepear."  Among  the  Poets,  we  omitted  one,  who  was 
almost  as  much  of  a  critic,  Beaumont,  who  died  at  twenty- 
nine  :  having  written  the  Maid's  Tragedy,  (a  delicate  as  well 
as  judicious  work)  at  twenty-one.  Pope  comes  in,  for  critical 
skill,  in  his  capital  versified  Essay  on  Criticism  at  twenty- 
one,  and  in  his  choice  letters,  those  to  Wycherly,  at  seven 
teen.  A  few  of  the  great  old  English  Divines,  we  have 
looked  into,  for  this  particular  purpose.  We  gather  these 
results  :  Fuller,  the  wit  and  church  historian's  first  work, 
came  out  when  he  was  twenty-three.  Taylor  was  Laud's, 
and  South  Clarendon's  chaplain  ;  and  known  universally  for 
their  eloquence,  at  twenty-seven.  Butler  corresponded  with 
Dr.  Clarke  while  a  boy  at  school. 

A  few  miscellaneous  instances.  Feltham's  Resolves  was 
written  at  eighteen,  a  remarkable  instance  of  youthful  judg 
ment. 

The  sagacious,  brave  Burleigh,  first  held  office  at  court 
when  just  twenty-two.  Sir  Thomas  More,  before  him,  had 
been  elected  to  parliament  at  the  same  age.  Pitt  was  pre 
mier  at  twenty-five.  Hallam,  while  a  collegian,  planned  his 


EARLY    MATURITY    OF    GENIUS.  151 

history  of  the  Middle  Ages.  The  founders  of  the  Edinburgh 
Review,  and  the  ablest  writers  for  it,  were  all  of  them  young 
men — Jeffrey,  Macintosh,  Brougham,  Smith. 

Certain  persons  cannot  see,  that  judgment,  where  it  is  the 
nicest,  most  tolerant,  and  comprehensive,  and  exact,  is  not 
always  the  fruit  of  study  nor  the  growth  of  experience.     It 
often  precedes   both  ;  and  is  an  instinctive  faculty — an  ori 
ginal  talent — applying   this  truth  to  the  instances  of  a  low 
judgment  in  matters  (not  of  literature  or  philosophy,  as  we 
have  considered  it)  relating  to  ordinary  business.     Steele  has 
a  paper  of  excellent  sense  and  liberal  tendency  in  the  Lover, 
written  with  his  accustomed  facility  and  grace.     The  writer 
of  the  thoughts  on  the  subject  is  supposed  to  be  a  corres 
pondent,  a  young  man,  who  complains  bitterly  of  "  a  general 
calamity  that  obstructs  or  suspends  the  advancement  of  the 
younger  men  in  the  pursuit  of  their  fortune" — (a  complaint 
not  to  be  rashly  made  in  this  country).     "  The  utmost  incon 
veniences  are  owing  to  the  difficulty  we  meet  with  in  being 
admitted  into  the  society  of  men  in  years,  and  adding  thereby 
the  early  knowledge  of  men  and  business  to  that  of  books, 
for  the  reciprocal  improvement  of  each  other.     One  of  fifty 
as  naturally  imagines  the  same  insufficiency  in  one  of  thirty, 
as  he  of  thirty  does  of  one  of  fifteen,  and  each  age  is  thus  left 
to  instruct  itself  by  the  natural  course  of  its  own  reflection 
and  experience."     Further  on,  he  remarks  thus  :  "  Of  the 
common  divisions  of  business,  which  everybody  knows  are 
directed  by  form,  and  require  rather  diligence  and  honesty  than 
grave  ability  in  the  execution."    Truly  enough,  most  business 
is  purely  mechanical ;  and  the  so-styled  learned  professions 
are  as  mechanical  in  their  pedantic  adherence  to  forms,  as 
any  branch  of  mechanics.     The  true  conclusion  Steele  aims 
at,  is  couched  in  the  following  passage,  which  appears  to  us 


152  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

to  hit  the  truth  with  accuracy  and  justice  : — "  A  good  judg 
ment  will  not  only  supply,  but  go  beyond  experience  ;  for  the 
latter  is  only  a  knowledge  that  directs  us  in  the  dispatch  of 
matters  future,  from  the  consideration  of  matters  past  of  the 
same  nature  ;  but  the  former  is  a  perpetual  and  equal  direc 
tion  in  everything  that  can  happen,  and  does  not  follow,  but 
makes  the  precedent  that  guides  the  other.'7 

If  we  come  nearer  home,  and  take  our  examples  from 
American  literature,  we  shall  be  taught  to  look  with  gene 
rosity  on  young  writers,  and  take  heed  lest  we  merit  the  wise 
censure  of  Cowley,  who  has  written,  "it  is  an  envious  frost 
that  which  nips  the  blossoms,  because  they  appear  quickly." 
Hardly  an  instance  in  American  literature  of  a  late  writer  of 
the  first  class,  can  be  referred  to.  Our  poets  have  been  won 
derfully  precocious.  Bryant  can  be  paralleled  only  by  Cole 
ridge.  Thanatopsis  was  written  at  eighteen ;  we  recollect  no 
poem  of  equal  excellence  produced  so  early  by  any  poet,  save 
the  author  of  the  Ancient  Manner.  Yet  Bryant  has  done 
nothing  finer.  The  only  wonder  is,  that  he  alone  has  pre 
served  his  poetical  faculty,  pure  and  fresh,  still.  Dana,  his 
contemporary,  has  long  been  silent ;  so,  too,  we  may  say,  of 
Halleck  and  their  compeers,  Pierpoint,  Sprague,  and  Perci- 
val.  Four  of  our  most  promising  bards  died  young — Drake 
and  Eastburn,  and  Sands  and  Brainard.  The  true  succes 
sors,  in  some  cases  their  equals,  or  their  superiors,  are  still 
young — Holmes,  Willis,  Longfellow,  Mathews,  and  Lowell. 
Our  best  fiction  was  written  by  young  men,  Cooper  and 
Brown,  who  produced  "  Wieland"  at  twenty  seven.  Irving 
and  Paulding  have  long  since  concluded  their  career  as  mas 
terly  comic  satirists.  Webster's  later  speeches  are  not  equal 
to  his  first  orations.  Wirt  neglected  literature  as  soon  as  he 
began  to  rise  in  his  profession.  But,  of  former  cases  in  point, 


NOTORIETY.  153 

we  suspect  it  is  not  generally  known  that  our  great  men,  of 
the  Revolutionary  age,  were  uncommonly  premature.  Fisher 
Ames  made  a  great  speech  at  the  age  of  twenty-three. 
Hamilton,  a  youth,  wrote  essays  ascribed  to  Jay.  Jay,  still 
a  young  man,  wrote  the  address  to  the  people  of  Great  Bri 
tain,  just  previous  to  the  Revolution.  Washington,  at  twenty- 
three,  was  commander  of  the  Virginia  forces.  Patrick  Henry 
and  Jefferson  were  both  of  them  greatly  distinguished  before 
thirty.  At  present,  our  leading  periodical  writers,  active 
politicians,  clergymen,  and  men  of  letters  generally,  are,  in 
nine  cases  out  of  ten,  as  might  readily  be  shown,  if  it  were 
proper  to  mention  names,  men  under  thirty  years  of  age.  It 
is,  therefore,  dangerous  to  advise  a  young  man,  or  any  man 
of  ability,  to  refrain  from  composition,  or  any  walk  of  active 
life,  unless  the  critic  be  well  assured  that  he  is  of  at  least 
equal  rank  in  respect  to  abilities  and  acquisitions,  that  no 
tendency  of  jealousy  or  feeling  of  envy  can  be  possibly  as 
cribed  to  him,  and  that  he  possess  an  assemblage  of  qualities, 
mental  and  moral,  that  rarely  falls  to  the  lot  of  a  single  indi 
vidual.  Let  it  be  remembered,  too,  that  to  be  worthily  re 
ceived,  and  have  its  due  weight,  advice  must  be  sought ;  else 
it  will  be  justly  regarded  in  the  light  of  an  impertinent  intru 
sion  and  voluntary  censure. 


xxr. 

NOTORIETY. 


A  WRITER  who  could  unite  the  philosophy  of  Bacon  and  the 
satire  of  Churchill,  would  be  the  author  to  undertake  an  essay 
on  Notoriety.  In  the  absence  of  any  such  extraordinary  com- 


154  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

bination  of  talent,  we  venture  to  address  ourselves  to  the  sub 
ject  ;  to  revive  certain  moral  sentiments  of  equal  worth  and 
antiquity,  an  abundant  apology  for  which,  if  any  were  neces 
sary,  would  be  found  in  the  very  fact  of  the  great  excellence 
of  the  sentiments  themselves. 

Ancient  fame  has  given  place  to  modern  notoriety.  Solid 
repute  is,  now-a-days,  lost  in  fashionable  applause,  and  the 
hero  and  bard,  whose  praise  has  furnished  the  theme  of 
centuries,  is  cast  into  the  shade  by  the  idol  of  the  hour.  Of 
the  different  varieties  of  notoriety  attainable  by  the  arts  of 
intrigue,  the  quackeries  of  impudence,  or  the  settled  fraud 
of  a  lifetime,  we  shall,  after  running  over  the  titles  of  a  few, 
confine  ourselves  at  present,  chiefly  to  notoriety  in  literature, 
to  the  means  of  making  a  reputation  by  cant,  imposture,  and 
the  influence  of  fashion. 

Notoriety  is  spurious  fame  ;  a  desire  of  obtaining  it,  false 
ambition.  One  intoxicated  with  the  love  of  public  fame 
(in  the  lower  view  of  fame),  had  rather  be  ill-known  than 
unknown.  At  any  sacrifice,  he  would  make  a  name.  He 
would  be  talked  of,  if  not  cared  for ;  had  rather  be  in  men's 
mouths  than  in  their  hearts.  He  would  be  well  spoken  of 
rather  than  trivially  thought  of.  It  is  not  that  he  would  be 
always  praised— nay,  sometimes  he  would  prefer  abuse,  as 
an  object  of  attack,  and  to  give  him  an  opportunity  of  reply 
ing  to  it.  It  is  the  weak  man's  diseased  ambition ;  the  fool's 
fame;  the  knave's  bane;  the  courtier's  life;  the  fopling's 
breath ;  the  wise  man's  detestation ;  the  honest  man's  disgust. 

Notoriety  is  attached  to  every  calling  and  profession,  art, 
science,  trade  or  mystery.  There  is  nothing  in  life  which  it 
may  not  affect ;  no  face  it  cannot  assume. 

It  haunts  the  pulpit,  the  university,  the  bar,  the  surgeon's 
hall ;  it  is  found  in  political  assemblies  and  literary  meetings  ; 


NOTORIETY.  155 

it  rules  supreme  in  the  drawing-room,  the  theatre,  the  street, 
the  watering-place,  the  tavern. 

What  ways  and  means  are  employed  to  accomplish  the 
great  end  !  what  struggles  and  anxieties  to  appear  what  one 
is  not !  what  endeavors  to  hide  these  very  attempts !  A 
private  scandal,  or  a  newspaper  paragraph ;  an  abusive  letter 
•written  by  the  party  in  question  to  himself ;  a  self-inflicted 
libel ;  a  domestic  quarrel ;  a  course  of  libertinism  made 
public ;  these  are  a  few  of  the  thousand  baits  to  catch  the 
public  ear.  A  public  official  relieves  a  poor  woman,  the  act 
is  at  once  translated  into  the  newspapers ;  a  wealthy  citizen 
has  fallen  ill,  it  is  immediately  chronicled ;  a  valuable  shawl 
is  worn  by  the  wife  of  a  celebrated  statesman,  it  is  universally 
made  known.  It  is  the  whole  business  of  the  entire  lives  of 
most  of  the  butterflies  of  fashion,  to  plot  how  they  shall 
make  themselves  conspicuous  from  day  to  day.  Absurdities 
in  dress  or  equipage  are  getting  to  be  stale  devices ;  what 
we  shall  have  next,  we  are  wanting  in  imagination  to  con 
ceive. 

How  to  make  a  reputation  in  letters,  is  a  nice  problem  for 
him  to  solve  who  has  neither  learning,  genius,  talents,  nor 
enthusiasm.  It  is  generally  persons  devoid  of  these  funda 
mental  requisites  that  most  affect  the  fame  of  author  and 
scholar;  though  it  must  be  confesesd,  their  purposes  are 
ulterior,  and  do  not  rest  in  the  bare  enjoyment  of  a  name. 
They  catch  at  the  chance  of  reputation  for  the  sake  of  an 
introduction  into  what  is  called  (one  would  think  from  irony) 
good  society,  or  even  for  the  mere  gratification  of  seeing 
their  names  in  print. 

Cant  in  literature  is,  next  to  cant  in  religion,  the  most 
despicable  thing  in  the  world  ;  the  cant  of  the  pretenders  to 
literature  is  always  so  thorough-going  as  quite  to  obscure  a 


156  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

really  worthy  but  modest  scholar.  The  quack  will  carry  off 
by  far  the  plurality  of  votes  by  the  mere  force  of  external 
display. 

Fashion  is  never  more  absurd  than  in  her  patronage  of 
letters.     She  inevitably  mistakes  pretence  for  performance, 
and  fails  to  distinguish  between  merit  and  presumption.     A 
fashionable  author  is,  generally,  a  writer  whose  books  are 
read  only  by  people  of  fashion,  and  that  only  for  a  season  or 
two.      The  fashionable  author  is  made  such,  more  by  his 
manner  and  address  than  by  any  quality  in  his  writings 
worthy  of  notice.     He  dresses  well,  therefore  takes  rank  as 
an  elegant   poet :    he   can  carve  neatly,  hence  is   granted 
station  as  a  critic  or  philosopher.     The  true  poet,  the  genuine 
philosopher,  is  never  fashionable — except  as  an  incident  to 
his  reputation — it  being  a  peculiar  quality  of  the  servile 
crowd   to  join  in  wherever  they  hear  a  shout.     The  great 
author  writes  for  the  whole  world ;   the  writer  of  fashion  for 
a  very  circumscribed  sphere  or  clique  of  readers.     What  is 
in  cant  phrase  styled  the  "  great  world  "  of  fashion,  is,  in  fact 
the  most  insignificant  field  of  authorship.    Fashionable  people 
take  more  pleasure  in  creating  reputation  out  of  nothing,  than 
in  worshipping  established  idols,  inasmuch  as  it  gratifies  their 
self-love.     Of  an  inferior  scribbler  they  make  a  genius  for  a 
season,  and  then  cast  him  off,  as  they  do  their  tailor  or  their 
hounds — whence  the  poor  victim  readily  concludes,  or  should » 
that  notoriety,  like  all  matters  of  fashion,  is  merely  a  reign 
ing  folly,  a  current  prejudice. 

Somewhat  connected  with  the  subject  of  fashionable  repu 
tation,  is  the  question  of  the  public  taste,  more  influenced  by 
mere  notoriety,  than,  perhaps,  most  readers  imagine. 

As  a  general  rule,  the  public  taste  is  vicious  to  a  great  de 
gree.  This  is  abundantly  proved  by  the  innumerable  in- 


NOTORIETY.  157 

stances  of  ephemeral  popularity,  and  consequent  neglect  of 
many  of  the  best  writers.  Their  works  happen  to  hit  a  par 
ticular  taste,  or  favor  a  prevailing  fashion ;  they  chime  in 
with  the  prejudices,  and  foster  the  passions  of  the  day,  and 
are  rewarded  by  a  short  lived  reputation.  In  judging  of 
poetry,  in  particular,  one  can  hardly  be  too  fastidious,  who 
recollects  that  at  one  time  Jonson  lorded  it  over  Shakspeare : 
at  another,  Cato  was  esteemed  the  first  of  English  tragedies  : 
and  still  later,  Darwin  and  Hayley  were  thought  great  poets. 
How  many  schools  are  extinct,  how  many  great  men  have 
proved  in  the  eyes  of  posterity  (that  seyere  judge),  very  small 
persons  indeed  !  How  many  philosophical  systems  have 
been  consigned  to  oblivion,  with  their  inventors  and  promul- 
gators  !  What  shoals  of  tragedies,  epics,  novels  of  every 
description,  lives,  travels,  sermons,  speeches,  and  periodicals, 
choke  up  the  river  of  Lethe — across  that  stream  who  can 
venture  unless  first  drugged  to  sleep  by  the  pages  of  a  writer 

Sleepless  himself,  to  give  his  readers  sleep  ? 

Taste  is  a  natural  sensibility  to  excellence,  heightened  by 
the  nicest  observation,  and  perfected  by  close  study.  If  we 
allow  this,  how  dare  the  great  multitude  of  readers  to  set  up 
their  critical  claims  ?  Every  man  now  is  a  reader,  and  a 
critic  of  course.  What  a  monstrous  absurdity  is  this  ?  In 
other  things  we  see  its  ridiculousness,  but  we  seem  blind 
here. 

The  purest  poetry  and  the  noblest  philosophy  are  so  much 
above  the  comprehension  of  vulgar  minds,  that  they  never 
can  be  popular — so  with  the  most  delicate  wit  and  humor, 
and  the  finest  works  of  fancy.  Pure  language  and  an  elegant 
simplicity,  are  also  out  of  the  reach  of  common  intellects. 


158  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS.      • 

Sure  fame  is  a  very  different  thing  from  notoriety.  Cowley 
has  placed  the  idea  of  fame  in  the  proper  light.  He  says, 
"  I  love  and  commend  a  true  good  fame,  because  it  is  the 
shadow  of  virtue :  not  that  it  doth  any  good  to  the  body 
which  it  accompanies,  but  it  is  an  efficacious  shadow,  and, 
like  that  of  St.  Peter,  cures  the  diseases  of  others."*  The 
true  fame  is,  "that  which  follows,  not  that  which  is  run 
after;"  the  companion  of  goodness,  not  the  lacquey  of  fashion. 

We  have  treated  notoriety  as  a  fraud  of  men  ;  it  is  some 
times  the  dream  of  youth — an  honest  dream.  When  we  are 
young,  we  are  goaded  by  a  false  impulse,  and  would  be 
famous  without  any  regard  to  the  conditions  of  obtaining 
fame ;  but  when  years  have  brought  a  certain  equable 
gravity  of  temper,  and  calmness  of  judgment,  we  begin  to 
see  things  in  their  true  colors,  and  to  value  a  life  of  virtue 
above  a  life  of  honors.  We  at  last  discover  the  pitiful  shifts 
of  those  who  would  obtain  notoriety,  and  the  incredible 
meannesses  to  which  they  subject  themselves,  by  their  igno 
rant  zeal  in  the  pursuit  of  worldly  glory.  Titles,  wealth, 
applause,  what  chimeras  ye  are !  what  bubbles  ye  make  of 
us  your  greedy  followers  !  The  highest  powers  of  intellect, 
the  most  brilliant  gems  of  poesy,  are  incomparably  inferior  to 
the  possession  of  a  peaceful  conscience,  and  a  heart  filled 
with  none  but  good  intentions. 

The  fame  of  the  popular  poet,  or  the  great  general,  has  an 
almost  overpowering  charm  for  the  young  man  ;  but  a  later 
age,  which  cools  his  blood,  clears  his  mind  also,  and  he  only 
wonders  how  he  ever  happened  to  entertain  such  images  of 
greatness,  as  the  gods  of  his  idolatry.  The  flashes  of  the 
skilful  rhetorician  captivate  the  youthful  student ;  but  the 

*  Essay  on  Obscurity. 


NOTORIETY.  159 

powers  of  the  philosophic  reasoner  attract  his  maturer  judg 
ment.  Light,  airy  poetry  is  fit  food  for  the  raw  critic ;  but 
experience  and  reflection  give  the  palm  to  a  deeper  and 
more  majestic  vein.  Amusement  gains  us  then,  but  instruc 
tion  holds  us  now.  Then,  we  imagine  we  have  learnt  all 
that  is  to  be  known  ;  now,  we  feel  our  real  ignorance  of  the 
highest  mysteries,  and  would  die  learning.  Thus  we  see  the 
love  of  applause  (in  its  place,  and  in  its  integrity,  a  noble  in 
centive  to  generous  action)  is  still  an  insufficient  motive. 
Milton,  in  that  well  known  passage,  which  summons  all  the 
powers  of  the  soul  as  with  the  sound  of  a  trumpet,  has  writ 
ten  nobly  of  fame — as 

The  spur  which  the  clear  spirit  doth  raise. 
Though  he  feels  obliged  to  add 

(That  last  infirmity  of  noble  minds), 

To  scorn  delights  and  live  laborious  days. 

Yet  as  fame  is  not  altogether  of  a  disinterested  nature 
(though  the  interested  ness  is  of  the  highest  character),  it  can 
not  furnish  the  only  sure  foundation  for  a  life  of  virtue.  The 
sense  of  duty  is  our  only  resource  ;  and  on  that,  as  on  an 
eternal  and  immutable  foundation,  we  may  erect  a  super 
structure  as  high  as  our  genius  may  serve  to  raise  it,  snored 
to  both  genius  and  virtue. 


XXII. 

LETTERS. 


NEXT  to  the  essay,  the  letter  is  the  most  agreeable  form  of 
the  minor  literature.     It  is  the  most  familiar  species  of  writ 
ing,  and  approaches  the   nearest   to   ordinary   convention. 
Letters  are  the  opuscula  of  great  authors,  but  they  form  the 
opera  of  lesser  writers.     We  weekly  critics  and  magazinists 
may  be  proud  of  a  volume  of  clever  epistles,  fearful  of  essay 
ing  a  higher  flight.     Authors  of  the  first  class,  and  with  the 
highest  pretensions,  affect  to  look  down  upon  letters  as  the 
mere  entertainment  of  a  scholar;  and  hence,  from  want  of 
sympathy,  no  less  than  from  want  of  nicety  of  apprehension 
and  subtle  delicacy  of  taste,  have  almost  uniformly  failed  in 
this  department  of  composition.     A  professed  orator,  a  great 
divine,  poet  or  philosopher,  cannot  easily  descend  from  the 
heights  of  speculation  and  eloquence  and  imagination,  to  the 
plain  ground  of  commonplace  reality.     Raillery  is  the  most 
delightful  talent  in  epistolary  composition  (a  delicate  talent)  ; 
and  next  to  that,  refined  sentiment.     These  are  minute  ex 
cellences,   however   agreeable,  in   the  great   character,  and 
the   incidental   ornaments  of  a   strong   intellect.      Women 
uniformly  write  the  best  letters,  both  of  the   narrative   kind 
and  lively  description.     Lady  Montague  and  Madame  D'Ar- 
blay  are  yet  unsurpassed.     The  female  intellect  is  allowed  to 
possess  a  finer  tact  and  a  minuter  (instinctive)  observation  of 
things  and  characters,  than  the  manly  understanding.     It  is 
better  pleased  with  the  details  of  a  subject,  and  paints  the 
manners  with  a   lighter   hand.     Boarding  school  girls,  and 
young  ladies,  who  have  just   "  come  out,"  are  readier   with 
their  pens  in  recounting  family  history,  and  current   fashion- 


LETTERS.  161 

able  news  ;  in  giving  a  relation  of  the  incidents  at  a  ball  or 
dinner-party,  at  sketching  portraits  of  the  beaux  and  their 
admirers;  and,  in  a  word,  at  all  the  arts  of  gossiping  and 
scandal,  than  boys  or  young  men,  much  older.  Richardson 
has  shown  this  very  conclusively  in  his  novels.  His  letters 
are  the  very  counterparts  of  those  of  young  ladies  in  the  same 
situation,  and  such  as  they  would  naturally  write. 

Letters  are  valuable  for  many  reasons.      As  a  test  of  cha 
racter,  and  affording  an  unconscious  autobiography — as  ma 
terials  for  literary  and  political  history— as  pictures  of  the 
times — as  the  repositories  of  individual  opinions  and  peculiar 
sentiments.     As  a  test  of  character,  letters  are  worth  much 
more  than  the  more  ordinary  (supposed)  keys  to  that  sort  of 
knowledge.      A  man's  autograph  may  be  very  far  from  cha 
racteristic.      I  know  a  generous   man,  who  writes  a  mean, 
cramped  scrawl,  and  an  undecided  one,  whose  chirography  is 
firm  and  regular.     Physiognomy  may  belie  the  brightness  of 
the  head  and  the  goodness  of  the  heart.     Phrenology  may 
regard  as  an  indifferent  specimen  the  casket  that  contains  a 
golden  brain.     But  a  number  of  confidential  letters  addressed 
to  familiar  friends,  and  written  in    all  the   warmth  of  con 
fidence,  afford  the  fairest  moans  of  getting  at  the  real  cha 
racter  of  the  writer.     Yet  insincerity  may  occur  here.    Letters 
are  often  written  for  the  public  eye,  though   on   the    most 
confidential  subjects.     Pope  and  Walpole  wrote  for  posterity. 
They  wrote  at,  rather  than  to,  their  correspondents.     So,  also, 
of  the  French  wits.     We  confine  ourselves  entirely  to  English 
authors,  however,  in  the  present  paper.     Some  authors  have 
told  their  history  in  letters,  as  llowell,  Gray,  Oowper,  Burns, 
and  Lamb, — dwelling  on  petty  occurrences  and  comparatively 
slight  traits,  with  an  unction  and  gusto  that  would  not  bo 
allowed  in  a  formal  biography.     Of  the  historical  value  of 


162  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

letters,  no  complete  student  can  doubt,  and  none  but  he  can 
appreciate  it  adequately. 

English  literature  is  rich  in  letters  from  Howell  to  Lamb. 
Intermediately,  we  have  Pope  and  his  friends,  Cowper,  Burns, 
Gray,  Walpole,  Lady  Montague  ;  a  sufficient  variety,  surely, 
both  of  talent  and  character.  We  had  intended  to  have 
drawn  up  a  classification  of,  and  criticism  upon,  the  different 
sorts  of  letters,  but  find  the  whole  matter  so  handsomely 
handled  in  the  very  first  letter  of  Howell,  (Epistolse-Ho- 
eliange.)  that  we  insert  it  instead :  "  It  was  a  quaint  dif 
ference  the  ancients  did  put  betwixt  a  letter  and  an  oration  ; 
that  the  one  should  be  attired  like  a  woman,  the  other  like 
a  man.  The  latter  of  the  two  is  allowed  large  siderobes,  as 
long  periods,  parentheses,  similes,  examples,  and  other  parts 
of  rhetorical  flourishes :  but  a  letter  or  epistle  should  be  short- 
coated  and  closely  couched  ;  a  hungerskin  becomes  a  letter 
more  handsomely  than  a  gown.  Indeed  we  should  write  as 
we  speak,  and  that  is  a  true  and  familiar  letter  which  ex- 
presseth  one's  mind,  as  if  he  were  discoursing  with  the  party 
to  whom  he  writes  in  succinct  and  short  terms.  The  tongue 
and  the  pen  are  both  of  them  interpreters  of  the  mind ;  but 
I  hold  the  pen  to  be  the  more  faithful  of  the  two.  The 
tongue  in  udo  posita,  being  seated  in  a  most  slippery  place, 
may  fail  and  falter  in  her  sudden  extemporal  expressions,  but 
the  pen,  having  a  greater  advantage  of  premeditation,  is  not 
so  subject  to  error,  and  leaves  things  behind  it  upon  firm  and 
authentic  record.  Now  letters  (here  comes  the  division), 
though  they  be  capable  of  any  subject,  yet  commonly  they 
are  either  narratory,  objurgatory,  consolatory,  monitory,  or 
congratulatory.  The  first  consists  of  relations,  the  second 
of  reprehensions,  the  third  of  comfort,  the  two  last  of  counsel 
and  joy."  Then  follows  some  very  just  and  severe  criticism  : 


LETTERS.  163 

*'  There  are  some  who,  in  lieu  of  letters,  write  homilies ; 
they  preaoh  when  they  should  epistolize  (and  it  is  easier  to 
do  the  former  than  the  latter)  ;  there  are  others  that  turn 
them  to  tedious  tractates."  Howell,  himself,  the  earliest  of 
our  letter  writers,  is  a  capital  fellow  in  his  way ;  but  he  has 
not  mentioned  all  the  varieties  of  letters.  There  are  the  pre 
cise  letters  of  business,  and  the  ardent  love  letters  ;  to  a  third 
and  disinterested  person,  both  of  these  are  not  only  indif 
ferent,  but  even  tiresome.  The  purely  literary  letter  is  not 
mentioned,  i.  e.,  that  in  which  topics  of  literature  and  the 
characters  of  authors  are  discussed ;  mere  letters  of  compli- 
ment,  or  formal  civility,  are  not  recognised,  nor  lively,  gay 
epistles,  that  turn  upon  nothing. 

Some  persons  keep  no  letters  by  them.  Hazlitt  destroyed 
all  he  received  :  a  very  poor  compliment,  we  think,  to  a  clever 
correspondent,  to  say  nothing  of  the  letters  of  a  valued  friend. 
Others  hoard  up  every  scrap  of  a  note  ;  this  is  as  wrong  in  a 
different  way.  Many  indifferent  communications  are  re 
ceived,  but  the  choice  correspondence  is  of  another  character. 
Shenstone  speaks  somewhere  of  the  melancholy  pleasure  he 
took  of  a  rainy  day  when  his  spirits  were  low,  in  reading  over 
the  old  letters  of  a  dear  friend. 

This  retrospective  pleasure  is  truly  a  melancholy  one. 
Turning  over  the  precious  file,  we  encounter  the  affectionate 
protestations  of  one  who  has  cruelly  deceived  us,  of  the  gen 
erous  praises  of  a  now  bitter  enemy.  We  read  the  prophecies 
of  those  who  early  loved  and  appreciated  us,  and  who  can 
now  confirm  their  past  predictions.  Time  returns  anew ;  the 
present  is  merged  in  the  past,  and  scenes  long  gone  by  re 
vive  to  memory's  view !  Ah  !  could  we  but  recall  those 
feelings  to  which  we  received  such  a  sympathetic  reponse, 
those  "  hopes  and  fears,  an  undistinguishable  throng  ;"  could 


164  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

but  the  veil  of  years  be  removed,  and  youth  and  hope  and 
innocence  be  revealed,  then  indeed  might  an  Arcadian  age 
commence,  and  the  whole  world  look  green  and  happy.  It 
is  well  and  profitable  to  the  observer  of  human  nature,  and 
the  self-student,  to  re-peruse  his  collection  of  letters,  and  if  he 
can  procure  them,  to  study  his  own.  Viewed  in  connection 
with  passing  events,  they  form  an  unbroken  •  narrative,  and 
manifest  the  progress  of  tastes  and  sympathies,  improvement 
in  virtue,  and  accessions  of  knowledge.  The  didactic  letters, 
the  letters  of  business,  of  contention,  of  mere  scandal,  may  be 
safely  burned  ;  but  the  memorials  of  affection,  the  evidences 
of  friendship,  are  not  to  be  lightly  treated,  but,  dear  as  the 
apple  of  the  eye,  to  be  held  among  the  richest  treasures  of 
the  author,  the  thinker,  and  the  man. 


XXIII. 

POPE    AND    HIS    FRIENDS. 

THE  character  and  habits  of  mind  of  the  poet,  par  excellence 
"  of  Anna's  reign,"  are  vividly  depicted  in  his  correspondence. 
Writing  to  his  nearest  friends,  and  on  the  most  solemn 
themes,  Pope  never  forgot  his  authorship.  His  fame  was  too 
much  in  his  eye,  and  the  opinion  of  the  public,  in  his  mind. 
His  characteristic  refinement,  delicacy  of  judgment,  his  nicety 
of  expression  and  neat  turns  of  style,  appear  on  every  page. 
The  virtues  of  the  man,  too,  admirable  and  as  real  as  the 
merits  of  the  wit,  satirist,  and  moral-painter,  in  spite  of  his 


POPE    AND    HI3    FRIENDS.  1G5 

affectation  and  passion  for  intrigue  and  stratagem,  are  equally 
evident.     His  affections  and  regard  for  his  parents ;  his  de 
votion  to  his  friends ;  his  sincere  humanity  ;  his  generous 
sensibility.      The  personal  character  of  Pope,  owing  to  his 
brilliant  literary  success,  and  to  his  success  chiefly  in  satire, 
is  not  so  well  or  so  favorably  known  as  it  should  bo.     lie  is 
thought  by  many  to  have  been  what  he  was  humorously 
styled,   and  as  falsely  as  humorously,   "the  little  wasp  of 
Twickenham."    So  far  from  indulging  mean  spite  and  malice, 
the  heart  of  Pope  was  of  the  noblest  texture,  and  its  impulses 
governed  by  the  most  exalted  sentiments.     If  ever  there  was 
a  true-hearted  and  magnanimous  nature,  in  default  of  his 
crooked  ways  and  unwise  circumlocutions,  it  was  Pope's.    To 
Pope  was  addressed  not  only  the  hollow,  courtly  speeches  of 
the  titled  and  great,  but  the  sincerest  praises  of  England's 
finest  wits  and  most  delicate  geniuses  were  accorded  to  Pope, 
and  Pope  was  loved  and  honored,  as  well  as  admired  and 
praised.     He  secured  the  personal  atfection  of  men,  not  only 
of  talents  equally  fine  and  attic  with   his  own,  but  in  some 
walks  superior,  and  whose  own   natures  and  tempers  were 
above  all  praise.     Only  survey  the  list  of  Pope's  intimate  as 
sociates  :  Addison,  Swift,  Gay,  Berkeley,  Bolingbroke,  Steele, 
Arbuthnot,    Parnell,    Wycherly,    Congreve,    Garth,    Jervas, 
Fenton,  Hugh  Bethel,  Ralph  Allen,  Rowe,  and  Sir  William 
Trumbull,  Secretary  Craggs,  Earls  Halifax  and  Burlington, 
Bishop  Atterbury,  the  Blounts,  the  Digbys,  Cromwell,  and 
the  fine  ladies  of  the  day.     It  may  be  safely  hazarded  as  a 
general  remark,  that  not  a  single  distinguished  man  of  letters 
or  public  character  in  the  kingdom  was  unknown  to  Pope. 
He  was  regarded,  and  justly,  as  the  Horace  and  Voiture  of 
England  united,  and  for  exact  justness  of  thought  and  pro 
priety  of  language,  for  wit  (the  like  of  which  we   have  not 


166  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

since  seen),  for  comic  fancy,  and  for  exquisite  compliment,  he 
was  unrivalled — but  chiefly  as  a  moral  satirist  and  judge, 
equally  of  books  and  artificial  life,  was  he  considered  admir 
able,  and  in  these  walks  he  is  decidedly  a  master. 

Pope  was  as  precocious  in  his  prose  compositions  as  in  his 
poetical  attempts.  His  early  correspondence  was  almost  all 
of  it  written  before  the  age  of  twenty.  At  sixteen,  he  com 
menced  his  correspondence  with  Wycherly,  then  near  seventy, 
and,  it  must  be  confessed,  Pope  has  the  best  of  the  bargain. 
Shortly  after,  he  wrote  to  Walsh  and  Henry  Cromwell,  his 
early  friends  and  flatterers.  With  Wycherly  Pope  maintained 
a  perfect  war  of  compliments,  and  yet,  after  all,  they  quarrelled 
from  Pope's  plain  speaking,  when  he  was  forced  to  it.  Walsh, 
whom  Dryden  called  the  best  critic  in  England,  early  favored 
Pope,  and  augured  the  most  brilliant  success  for  him.  Pope 
has  not  forgotten  to  number  him  among  the  catalogue  of  his 
early  associates.  We  cannot  resist  quoting  the  fine  lines, 
often  as  they  are  referred  to  : — 

"  But  why  then  publish  ?     Granville,  the  polite, 
And  knowing  Walsh  would  tell  me  I  could  write  ; 
Well-natured  Garth,  inflamed  with  early  praise, 
And  Congreve  loved,  and  Swift  endured  my  lays  ; 
The  courtly  Talbot,  Somers,  Sheffield  read, 
E'en  mitred  Eochester  would  nod  the  head, 
And  St.  John's  self  (great  Dryden's  friend  before), 
With  open  arms  received  one  Poet  more. 
Happy  my  studies,  when  by  these  approved  ! 
Happier  their  author  when  by  these  beloved  ! 
From  these  the  world  will  judge  of  men  and  books, 
Not  from  the  Burnets,  Oldmixons,  and  Cooks." 

What  might  not  the  richest  fool  give  for  an  epithet  of 


POPE    AND    HIS    FRIENDS.  167 

praise  from  such  a  pen  !  what  higher  honor  for  the  author, 
but  to  see  his  name  on  the  same  page  with  that  of  Pope, 
though  his  be  at  the  bottom  and  the  Horace  of  England  very 
near  the  top  ! 

Henry  Cromwell  affected  to  bo  a  critic  (we  should  judge 
he  was  a  man-of-the- world  sort  of  scholar  from  his  letters,) 
and  Pope  discusses  with  him  questions  of  taste  and  criticism, 
the  Latin  poets,  versification,  etc.  He  devotes  a  letter  to 
Crash  aw,  in  this  part  of  his  correspondence,  which  abundantly 
proves  how  little  Pope  really  comprehended  the  genius  of 
that  noble  poet. 

Pope  early  courted  the  great,  much  as  he  afterwards 
affected  to  despise  them,  and  we  find  him  writing  to  Sir 
William  Trurabull,  and  Craggs,  Secretary  of  State,  as  well 
as  to  several  court  ladies,  the  style  of  whom  he  has  admirably 
parodied  in  his  letter  in  the  style  of  a  lady  of  quality.  Our 
anthor's  correspondence  with  ladies,  when  he  was  young,  he 
afterwards  used  to  contemn  as  puerile  efforts;  and  yet,  trifling 
as  they  are,  many  a  modern  gallant  of  middle  age  might  be 
happy  to  hit  the  frivolous  style  so  well,  which  was  current  at 
that  time.  The  prose  letters  of  Pope  to  women  certainly 
convey  a  very  mean  opinion  of  their  understanding,  though 
couched  in  elegant  phrase,  and  hidden  under  the  folds  of 
his  "  polite,  insinuating  style."  But  some  of  his  poetic 
epistles  to  ladies  are  beyond  all  praise,  as  that  masterpiece 
of  refinement  and  delicacy,  the  epistle  to  Miss  Blount,  with  a 
copy  of  Voiture's  epistles.  Each  couplet  contains  the  rarest 
essence  of  grace  and  wit,  and  elegant  sentiment,  at  times 
rising  into  brilliant  rhetoric,  and  the  whole  poem  is  compacted 
and  moulded  with  all  the  art,  and  in  the  most  ingenious 
form  of  the  master  of  poetic  form,  and  all  the  technicalities 
of  his  vocation.  There  were  among  the  throng  of  courtiers, 


168  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

however,  patrons  worthy  of  the  name,  and  nobles  deserving 
the  title.  Oxford  and  Halifax,  Craggs  and  Atterbury,  sank 
the  minister  in  the  friend,  in  their  intercourse  with  Pope, 
and  delighted  to  relieve  themselves  from  the  cares  of  state  in 
a  genial  intimacy  with  the  poet  at  his  rural  villa.  But  the 
true  friends  of  Pope,  as  indeed  the  truest  friends  of  every 
author,  were  his  fellow-scholars  and  brother  authors.  Let 
envy  and  malevolence  declaim  as  they  may,  true  men  of  sense 
and  genius,  the  world  over,  recognise  a  brother  in  each  other, 
and  band  together  for  the  preservation  of  social  harmony  and 
intellectual  freedom.  We  care  little  for  the  lords  and  ladies 
of  Pope's  acquaintance ;  but  who  does  not  delight  in  his  let 
ters  to  Gay,  and  Jervas,  and  Fenton,  and  (to  leave  the  society 
of  authors,  but  not  of  good  men)  to  those  noble  specimens 
of  human  nature,  Hugh  Bethel  and  Ralph  Allen  ?  Pope 
mistook  his  own  nature  when  he  turned  courtier.  He  had 
too  much  heart  for  the  character.  How  different  are  his  cold, 
cautious  compliments  to  the  great,  whom  he  loved  not,  from 
the  delicious  flatteries,  the  fruit  of  rich  affections  and  high 
appreciation,  he  was  accustomed  to  lavish  on  his  nearest 
friends  !  To  dwell  but  lightly  on  his  faults,  there  was  a  tinge 
of  insincerity  in  Pope ;  we  imagine,  however,  rather  a  vaccil- 
ation  of  opinion  than  any  settled  duplicity  of  intention.  We 
think  we  see  signs  of  this  in  his  correspondence  with  Addison, 
who,  it  must  be  confessed,  was  himself  too  suspicious,  and  in 
one  instance  treated  Pope  in  an  unwarrantably  deceitful 
manner.  Pope  appears  to  have  had  less  connection  with 
Steelo,  a  m  an  of  much  greater  frankness  and  candor  than  his 
associate.  Jervas,  the  painter,  was  a  life-long  friend  of  Pope, 
who  studied  the  art  of  portraiture  under  him,  but  never  carried 
it  to  any  perfection.  His  poetical  portraits  were  certainly 
fine  enough  for  any  reasonable  ambition.  In  his  epistle  to 


POPE    AXD    HIS    FRIENDS.  100 

Jcrvas,  a  meet  companion  for  his  fine  letter  to  Miss  Blouut, 
Pope  exclaims: 

"  Alas!  how  little  fr.-.m  the  grave  we  claim  ! 
Thou  but  preserv'st  a  face,  and  I  a  name." 

Posterity  has  preserved  the  names  embalmed  in  Pope's 
immortal  strain,  but  has  thrown  by,  in  her  lumber-room  of 
obscurity,  the  portraits  of  Jervas.  Swift  and  Gay,  Boling- 
broke  and  Peterborough,  are  the  chief  names  that  remain 
among  the  correspondents  of  Pope.  With  these  most  oppo- 
eite  characters,  the  one  pair  composed  of  a  man,  harsh, 
austere,  and  sour,  yet  manly,  friendly  and  firm  ;  the  other,  in 
wit,  a  man,  simplicity,  a  child;  wise  and  innocent,  penetrat 
ing,  yet  volatile,  a  poet,  philosopher,  courtier,  and  dupe :  the 
other  couple,  a  fashionable  sceptic  and  a  military  wit,  but 
wise  and  keen  observers,  accomplished  gentlemen,  men  of 
wit,  men  of  the  world,  men  of  action,  Pope  lived  not  only 
on  terms  of  perfect  amity,  but  in  the  unreservedness  of 
brotherhood ;  nay  more,  for  brothers  are  not  always  the 
nearest  friends.  The  Vicar  of  Laracor,  the  keenest  of 
•atirist,  the  manliest  of  misanthropes,  appears  in  his  letters 
to  Pope  in  his  most  attractive  phase.  He  writes  even  with 
an  honest  sensibility,  without  a  particle  of  mawkishness. 
To  Gay  he  writes  like  a  loving,  but  prudent  father,  beseech 
ing  that  imprudent  man  of  genius  to  lay  aside  his  hundred 
and  one  schemes,  and  nurse  his  little  fortune.  Gay  died  in 
middle  age,  and  therefore  never  knew  what  it  was  to  want 
the  comforts  of  life  in  an  old  age  of  poverty  and  friendless- 
ness.  Arbuthnot  was  the  idol  of  Swift..  He  thus  writes  of 
him,  with  mingled  admiration  and  humor:  "Oh,  if  the 
world  had  but  a  dozen  Arbuthnots  in  it,  I  would  burn  my 
travels!  But,  however,  he  is  not  without  a  fault.  There  is 
8 


170  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

a  passage  in  Bede,  highly  commending  the  piety  and  learn 
ing  of  the  Irish  in  that  age,  where,  after  abundance  of  praises, 
he  overthrows  them  all  by  lamenting  that,  alas,  they  kept 
Easter  at  the  wrong  time  of  the  year.  So  our  doctor  has 
every  quality  and  virtue  that  can  make  a  man  amiable  or 
useful ;  but,  alas,  he  has  a  sort  of  slouch  in  his  walk  !  I 
pray  God  protect  him,  for  he  is  an  excellent  Christian,  though 
not  a  Catholic." 

Lamb  valued  Pope  most  for  his  refined  compliments.  His 
prose  flattery  is  not  so  fine  as  his  poetic  eulogy ;  but  it  is 
very  elegant.  In  a  letter  to  Cromwell,  he  says  :  "  You  are 
so  good  a  critic,  that  it  is  the  greatest  happiness  of  the  mo 
dern  poets  that  you  do  not  hear  their  works"  (alluding  to  his 
deafness).  To  Jervas  he  concludes  a  letter  thus :  "  Come 
thou,  and  having  peopled  Ireland  with  a  world  of  beautiful 
shadows,  come  to  us  and  see  with  that  eye,  which,  like  the 
eye  of  the  world,  creates  beauties  by  looking  on  them."  To 
the  same  painter  he  writes  :  "  I  hope  the  spring  will  re 
store  you  to  us,  and  with  you,  all  the  beauties  and  colors  of 
nature. 

Pope's  affectionate  disposition  shines  through  all  his  works, 
but  we  do  not  recollect  a  more  striking  instance  than  the 
following  in  a  letter  to  a  correspondent  whose  name  is  with 
held.  "  I  cannot  express  how  1  long  to  renew  our  old  inter 
course  and  conversation ;  our  morning  conferences  in  bed  in 
the  same  room,  our  evening  walks  in  the  Park,  our  amusing 
voyages  on  the  water,  our  philosophical  suppers,  our  lectures, 
our  dissertations,  our  gravities,  our  reveries,  our  fooleries,  our 
what  not ! 

"  This  awakens  the  memory  of  some  who  made  a  part  in 
all  these.  Poor  Parnell,  Garth,  Rowe  !  You  justly  reprove 
me  for  not  speaking  of  the  death  of  the  last ;  Parnell  was 


POPE    AND    HIS    FRIENDS. 


too  much  in  my  mind,  to  whose  memory  I  am  erecting  the 
best  monument  I  can.  What  he  gave  me  to  publish  was 
but  a  small  part  of  what  he  left  behind  him  ;  but  it  was  the 
best,  and  I  will  not  make  it  worse  by  enlarging  it  ;  I  would 
fain  know  if  he  be  buried  at  Chester  or  Dublin  ;  and  what 
care  has  been  or  is  to  be  taken  for  his  monument,  etc.  Yet 
I  have  not  neglected  my  devoirs  to  Mr.  Rowe  :  I  am  writing 
this  very  day  his  epitaph  for  Westminster  Abbey.  After 
these,  the  best-natured  of  men,  Sir  Samuel  Garth,  has  left 
me  in  the  truest  concern  for  his  loss.  His  death  was  very 
heroical,  and  yet  unaffected  enough  to  have  made  a  saint  or 
a  philosopher  famous.  But  ill  tongues  and  worse  hearts 
have  branded  even  his  last  moments  as  wrongfully  as  they 
did  his  life,  with  irreligion.  You  must  have  heard  many 
tales  on  this  subject  ;  but  if  ever  there  was  a  good  Christian 
without  knowing  himself  to  be  so,  it  was  Dr.  Garth."  Thus 
nobly  did  Pope  vindicate  his  friends,  absent  or  dead.  Unlike 
our  modern  Damons,  he  did  not  from  a  warm  friend  become 
a  bitter  enemy,  but  preserved  through  life  his  ancient  regard 
with  all  the  steadfastness  of  a  true  man.  A  regulating 
Providence  will  preserve  the  fame  of  Pope  fair  and  unsullied 
by  the  breath  of  malice  or  the  tongue  of  slander  ;  the  just 
recompense  of  a  pure  heart  and  a  trusting  spirit. 

Contemporary  with  Pope,  "the  cynosure  of  neighboring 
eyes,"  the  centre  of  an  admiring  circle,  "  the  glass  of  fashion 
and  the  mould  of  form,"  a  wit,  an  authoress  and  a  fine 
woman,  lived  the  celebrated  Miss  Pierrepont,  more  generally 
known  under  the  name  and  title  of  Lady  Mary  Wortley 
Montague,  one  of  the  idols  of  Pope's  idolatry,  and  indisput 
ably  the  cleverest  woman  of  her  age.  The  reign  of  Queen 
Anne,  and  the  period  circling  about  that  epoch,  of  about 
thirty-eight  years,  from  the  commencement  of  the  reign  of 


172  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

King  William  III.  to  the  end  of  the  reign  of  George  L,  was, 
we  are  inclined  to  suspect,  the  transition  period  (to  employ  a 
fashionable  phrase)  in  the  estimation  of  female  character. 
Before  that  day  women  had  not  attained  their  just  position 
in  the  social  state,  and  since  that  time  they  have  met  with  a 
truer  regard  and  a  more  intelligent  homage  than  even  in  the 
days  of  knighthood  and  chivalry,  when  a  lady  meant  rather 
a  fanciful  abstraction  of  virtue  and  beauty,  made  only  for 
worship  and  extravagant  adulation  (insincere  and  therefore 
heartless,  and  consequently  insulting),  than  "  a  perfect  woman 
nobly  planned,"  "  a  phantom  of  delight,"  a  genial,  loving, 
household  companion  and  help-mate,  in  trial  and  adversity. 
Pope  himself  and  most  of  his  brother  wits  appear  to  have 
held  the  female  mind  and  the  female  heart  in  rather  a  low 
estimation,  but  the  characters  of  women  were  improving  in 
many  particulars.  They  lost  many  petty  foibles  as  they 
shifted  the  various  fashions  in  dress  and  manners.  The 
benevolent  ridicule  of  Addison  was  pointed  not  only  at  their 
patches  and  their  hair-dresses,  and  rouging,  but  also  at  their 
absurd  political  partisanship,  at  their  .preference  of  "  pretty 
fellows"  to  men  of  sense,  at  their  vacant  minds,  simpering 
manners,  ill-regulated  affections.  Swift's  pungent  satires  on 
fashionable  conversation  did  much ;  Pope's  characters  of 
women  effected  a  greater  reform,  as  if  to  falsify  the  satire ; 
but  to  Addison,  and  perhaps  still  more  to  the  gallant  Steele, 
were  the  ladies  mainly  indebted.  No  writers  equalled  this 
last  pair  in  administering  judicious  counsel  in  a  cheerful,  gay, 
graceful  manner,  by  which  they  charmed  those  who  charmed 
all  the  world  beside.  Public  opinion  and  a  better  system  of 
education  tended  greatly  to  setting  the  just  rights  of  woman 
in  a  proper  point  of  view.  The  goddess,  from  a  toy  and  a 
plaything,  the  alluring  charmer  of  an  idle  hour,  became  a 


POPE    AND    HIS    FRIENDS.  173 

pleasing,  modest,  domestic,  happy  woman,  enlightened,  en 
nobled,  and  refined.  Such  (to  take  the  most  favorable 
instances)  we  now  find  her.  From  a  general  digression  on 
the  state  of  female  society  in  the  reign  of  Queen  Anne  to 
the  brilliant  representative  of  the  intellectual  women  of  that 
society,  the  transition  is  natural.  Lady  Montague  is  not, 
perhaps,  after  all,  the  very  best  specimen,  for  she  was  more 
the  woman  of  clear,  acute  intellect,  and  of  fashion,  than  the 
quiet  wife  of  pure  sentiment  and  propriety  of  behavior. 
She  was  rather  the  Aspasia  (without  her  vices,  though  with 
her  attractions)  than  the  Cornelia  of  English  women — the 
fine  lady,  rather  than  the  polished  gentlewoman — the  am 
bitious  wit,  rather  than  the  natural  talker.  But  taking  her 
as  she  was,  she  must  have  been  as  fascinating  in  her  con 
versation  as  agreeable  in  her  letters,  and  altogether  a  delight 
ful  creature,  one  disgusting  foible,  or  rather  positive  defect 
excepted,  which  the  fastidious  reader  may  comprehend  by  a 
reference  to  the  Walpoliana.  Lady  Montague  was  almost 
the  first,  in  point  of  date,  among  English  female  writers, 
although  not  recognised  as  such  in  her  lifetime,  none  of  her 
compositions  having  been  published  until  after  her  decease. 
Lady  Russell,  Mrs.  Hutchinson,  Mrs.  Centlivre,  Mrs.  Behn, 
Mrs.  Manly,  and  a  few  obscure  writers,  had  preceded  her,  but 
none  in  her  own  department  had  approached  her.  She  is 
the  English  Sevigne,  unequalled  in  a  gay,  sprightly  vein,  and 
in  easy  natural  narrative  and  description.  The  bulk  of  her 
correspondence,  letters  from  Turkey,  presents  entertaining 
views  of  that  country,  as  a  book  of  travels.  She  had  the 
most  favorable  opportunities  of  obtaining  information  (her 
husband  being  the  English  ambassador  at  the  Sublime 
Porte),  and  made  diligent  use  of  them.  From  that  country 
also  she  derived  the  practice  of  inoculating  children  for  the 


CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 


small-pox,  by  which  humane  intervention  she  has  entitled 
herself  to  the  praise  of  patriotic  humanity.     With  all  her 
wit,  and  she  had  a  large  share;  in  the  very  face  of  her 
beauty,  which  was  extreme  ;  excluding  her  authorship  ;  ap 
plauding  her  charitable   exertions;   we  are  repelled   by  a 
strong  tinge  of  the  masculine  in  her  character.     A  vigorous 
mind   left  its  imprint  upon  her  disposition  and   manners. 
The  strong  understanding  admitted  coarseness  of  allusion 
and  freedom  of  style.     Her  descriptions  are  luxuriant  to 
voluptuousness;   the  atmosphere  of  the  harem  is  painted 
couleur  de  rose.     Vividness  of  fancy  is  perhaps  inconsistent 
with  delicacy  of  taste,  and  strong  conceptions  with  unim- 
passioned  beauty  of  painting.     The  woman  loses  what  the 
wit  gains,  and  we  feel  that  we  had  rather  admire  the  beauty 
and  applaud  the  wit,  than  take  the  woman  to  our  heart  for 
the  journey  of  life.     A  brilliant  evening  in  a  splendid  crowd 
can  never  make  amends  for  mornings  of  lassitude  and  ennui, 
and  years  of  dull,  cheerless,  uncompanionable  repinings  and 
moodiness.     Age  steals  the  roses  from  the  cheek  of  beauty, 
and  bereaves  the  woman  of  the  world  of  all  her  charms. 
Wit  is  clouded  and  grows  blunt  in  the  passage  of  years, 
while  the  heart  of  the  worldling  is  approaching  more  and 
more  closely  to  a  state  of  moral  ossification,  by  which  the 
soul  in   time  becomes  wholly  hardened,  and   the   human 
creature  is  converted  into  a  petrifaction.     We  are  far  from 
applying  the  whole  of  this  homily  to  Lady  Mary  ;   but,  we 
believe,  we  repeat  a  standard  criticism  in  objecting  to  a  por 
tion  of  her  writings,  and  to  some  of  her  habits  and  constitu 
tional  features. 


XXIV. 

GRAY      AND      COW  PER. 

THE  two  best  male  writers  of  letters,  between  Pope  and  Lamb, 
were  both  poets  like  them,  which  was  almost  the  sole  point 
of  resemblance  the  four  possessed  in  common.  They  all  had 
wit,  and  something  of  humor,  but  each  differed  from  his 
brother  bard.  Pope's  wit  was  courtly  and  refined ;  Gray's, 
like  his  taste,  fastidious ;  Cowper's  measured  and  moral,  like 
himself  in  public,  timid  and  restrained;  and  Lamb's  full  of 
the  whimsical  crotchets  which  formed  a  portion  of  his  indi 
viduality  and  temper. 

Johnson  has  underrated  Gray's  Pindaric  Poems  as  un 
justly  as  Hazlitt  has  overrated  his  letters.  There  are  noble 
and  grand  thoughts  filled  out,  and  expressed  in  language 
ardent  and  picturesque,  in  the  poems  of  Gray,  and  there  is  a 
majestic  sweep  in  the  pinions  of  his  muse,  which  he  has  finely 
described  in  his  own  line  of  the  eagle,  "  Sailing  wide  in 
supreme  dominion,  through  the  azure  depths  of  air."  He  is 
often  cold,  but  when  he  warms,  he  glows.  His  fire  is  the 
genuine  afflatus,  and  no  pasteboard  imitation  or  balloon  in 
flation.  At  times  he  comes  nearer  to  Milton  than  any  poet 
since  the  author  of  Paradise  Lost.  But  in  his  letters,  ele 
gantly  as  they  are  written  (the  English  is  remarkably  choice 
for  a  stickler  for  the  classics),  he  appears  by  no  means  in  his 
fairest  guise.  His  criticisms  in  many  cases  are  inadequate 
and  careless.  He  speaks  slightingly  of  Thompson's  charm 
ing  poems,  just  then  out.  He  relishes  Gresset,  however,  and 
speaks  with  respect  of  Southern.  Shaftesbury  he  anatomises 
keenly,  but  with  justice.  The  Greeks  and  Romans  always 
fare  well  at  his  hands,  but  his  contemporaries  he  has  little 


176  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

sympathy  for.  His  humor  (his  nearest  friends  thought  there 
lay  his  forte)  would  be  more  readily  appreciated  if  it  were 
less  elaborate — a  fine  humorist  and  good  fellow  was  spoiled 
in  the  pedantic  student.  For,  it  must  be  confessed,  Gray 
was  scholastic  to  pedantry  with  his  characteristic  nicety  and 
daintiness.  We  tire  of  few  things  so  soon  as  fastidiousness, 
for  it  is  impossible  to  love  those  whom  we  cannot  satisfy  or 
please.  Yet  we  sympathise  with  the  independence  of  the 
man  who  refused  to  retain  a  friendship  for  Walpole  after 
he  had  discovered  his  hollowness  and  fickle  nature  ;  and 
we  cannot  but  reverence  the  moroseness  and  admire  the 
secluded  life  of  one  who  despised  the  purse-pride  of  the 
wealthy,  and  from  the  lofty  elevation  of  his  genius  looked 
down  upon  the  arrogance  of  the  great  and  noble.  His  spirit 
had  all  the  vigor,  something  of  the  roughness,  and  an  ap 
pearance  (only  an  appearance)  of  the  sterility  of  the  hardy 
plants  of  the  cold  North  ;  but  like  them  it  bore  equally  well 
the  heats  of  July  and  the  snows  of  December,  and  in  itself  con 
taining  a  source  of  perennial  fruitfulness,  outbraved  the  mocks 
of  jealousy  and  lived  down  the  scorn  of  calumny.  It  still 
continues  in  all  its  original  freshness. 

The  style  of  Cowper's  letters  is  less  elaborately  elegant,  is 
simpler  and  more  agreeable  than  Gray's.  He  has  more  of 
nature.  Gray's  genius  was  high,  but  also  ambitious  ;  it  lacked 
naivete  and  unforced  ease.  His  art,  too,  was  rich  and  com 
posite,  but  not  so  refined  as  to  be  concealed.  Cowper's 
domestic  habits,  continual  living  with  and  among  women 
(while  Gray  lived  only  by  himself,  or  with  a  few  friends),  his 
moral  bias,  his  physical  indolence  and  timidity,  his  religious 
melancholy,  gave  a  distinct  coloring  to  all  his  productions. 
These  appeared  much  more  in  his  poetry  than  in  his  prose. 
In  his  letters  he  is  cheerful,  sometimes  gay.  His  vein  of 


GRAY    AND    COWPKE.  177 

humor  is  quite  unconscious,  and  the  more  delightful  for  that 
reason.  lie  had,  when  unbiassed,  a  fund  of  most  excellent 
sense,  with  a  clear  judgment.  His  natural  feelings  were  pure 
as  a  child's.  He  seems  to  have  been  a  man  without  guile : 
affectionate,  confiding  and  constant.  Yet  he  had  a  keen  eye 
for  folly,  and  a  talent  for  moral  satire  next  to  Pope,  and  we 
are  apt  to  think  sincerer.  He  occasionally  sketches  a  charac 
ter  with  brevity  and  point.  He  discovers  no  very  rich  stores 
of  acquired  learning,  but  much  wise  reflection. 

His  quiet  life  was  not  without  its  experience  and  hours  of 
contemplation.  He  loved  nature,  he  loved  innocent  animals, 
he  loved  the  society  of  virtuous  women,  and  good  men ;  and 
he  worshipped  in  truth  and  with  awful  gratitude  the  Being 
he  adored  and  loved.  Cowper  was  a  Christian  poet,  a  rare 
title  of  honor.  He  might  have  filled  a  high  political  station 
and  been  soon  forgotten.  Who  now-a-days  knows  any 
thing  of  the  great  lawyer,  Lord  Cowper?  Who  is  not 
acquainted  with  the  greater  poet,  William  Cowper?  Yet 
we  are  far  from  styling  Cowper  a  great  poet:  compared 
with  Milton,  and  Shakspeare,  and  Wordsworth,  he  ranks 
in  the  second  or  third  class  of  poets.  But  he  is  first  in 
that.  He  is  the  poet  of  domestic  life;  a  moral  satirist 
with  generous  indignation,  but  without  gall;  a  Christian 
psalmist  (no  hymns  are  finer  than  some  of  his),  and  a 
judicious,  pure-minded,  sweet-tempered,  warm-hearted  friend, 
counsellor,  and  companion.  Cowper's  English  is  select  and 
idiomatic.  It  is  as  racy  as  that  of  many  writers  more  noticed 
for  vigor,  and  yet  it  is  quite  free  from  the  least  taint  of  vul 
garity.  If  he  seldom  soared  very  high,  he  never  fell  into 
coarseness ;  and  his  style  is  as  free  from  moral  and  literary 
corruption,  as  his  wit  is  free  from  acerbity,  and  his  senti 
ment  from  affectation.  With  Cowper  we  shall  conclude, 
8* 


1*78  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS, 

since  Lamb  has  been  made  the  subject  of  so  much  delicate 
criticism  and  fine  writing  since  his  death,  that  we  cannot  aim 
at  novelty  without  disparaging  better  writers  and  better  quali 
fied  judges,  because  personal  friends,  than  any  American 
writers  can  pretend  to  be. 


XXV. 

AMATEUR    AUTHORS    AND    SMALL    CRITICS. 

AMONG  the  various  divisions  and  subdivisions  into  which  the 
trade  of  authorship  is  divided  we  recognise  two  classes; 
authors  by  profession,  and  amateur  writers :  those  who  re 
gard  study  and  composition  as  the  business  of  their  lives, 
and  those  who  look  upon  them  merely  as  incidental  occupa 
tions.  Now,  we  all  know  very  well  how  absurd  a  thing  it 
would  be  for  a  client  to  ask  the  services  of  an  amateur  lawyer, 
with  an  air  of  confidence  in  the  request,  and  in  the  expecta 
tion  of  his  faithful  attention  to  business ;  so,  too,  with  regard 
to  the  advice  of  an  amateur  physician;  and,  indeed,  the 
analogy  holds  in  every  walk  of  life.  Few  do  that  well  "  for 
love  "  which  can  be  better  done  for  money.  If  it  be  true  in 
the  common  concerns  of  life,  that  the  laborer  is  worthy  of  his 
hire,  it  is  much  more  to  be  so  considered  when  we  ascend 
in  the  scale  of  labor,  and  come  finally  to  that  which  most 
tasks  the  intellect  and  requires  the  greatest  number  of  choice 
thoughts.  Purely  imaginative  employmnnt,  invention  in  fic 
tion,  the  highest  class  (and  indeed  all  but  the  most  inferior 
department  of  poetry,  the  musa  pedestris),  must  afford  more 
of  delight  self-centered,  and  in  a  good  degree  independent  of 


AMATEUR    AUTHORS    AND    SMALL   CRITICS.  179 

pecuniary  reward  or  the  glory  of  a  noble  fame.  Yet  even 
poets  cannot  live  without  bread  and  broadcloth ;  and  so  far 
as  their  imperishable  and  spiritual  commodities  can  be  paid 
for,  should  be  remunerated  in  a  princely  manner.  But  in 
speaking  of  authors  and  men  of  letters  in  general,  we  shall 
except  the  few  grand  poets  from  our  remarks,  and  include 
rather  the  mass  of  good,  than  the  minority  of  great,  writers. 
We  do  not  intend  to  comprehend  in  our  list  either  the 
barely  respectable  scribes,  who  abound  now-a-day  as  thickly 
as  Dogberry's  whortleberries;  although  among  amateur 
authors  we  must  not  forget  that  for  one  really  clever  man  (not 
to  say  man  of  genius)  there  are  at  the  least  estimate  ninety 
and  nine  stupid  fellows,  who  assume  the  cloak  of  gravity 
wherewithal  to  hide  the  defects  of  dullness. 

A  merchant  is  respected  for  shrewdness  in  turning  a  penny, 
for  the  accumulation  of  a  fortune,  and  yet  we  hear  of  the 
mercenary  rewards  of  authorship,  and  the  base  equivalent  for 
the  productions  of  genius  :  as  if  the  more  a  man  gave  the 
less  he  should  ask ;  build  a  palace  at  less  cost  than  a  cottage. 
At  this  rate  a  sign-painter  would  be  entitled  to  higher  pay 
than  Raphael  himself;  and  we  might  take  our  strongest 
arguments  that  men  of  genius  should  be  nobly  rewarded  for 
their  magnificent  conceptions  and  labors,  from  the  simple 
class  of  painters.  The  great  old  masters  lived  like  princes, 
and  were  paid  as  the  great  lawyer  and  surgeon  of  our  own 
time  are  paid.  Yet  they  did  not  become  lazy  or  careless ; 
nor  did  wealth  stifle  the  fine  images  of  their  brains,  or  palsy 
the  masterly  skill  of  their  hands. 

Thoughts  form  the  merchandise  of  the  writer,  as  stuffs 
and  wares  of  the  trader.  If  the  one  can  convert  his  stock 
into  current  coin  as  readily  as  the  other,  on  the  mere  ground 
of  husbandry  he  deserves  no  little  credit  for  his  skill.  Fame 


180  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

is  a  noble  thing — it  cannot  be  too  highly  eulogized ;  but  fame 
alone  cannot  supply  the  necessities  of  physical  existence,  how 
ever  it  may  conduce  to  the  generous  expansion  of  sentiment, 
the  growth  of  the  soul.  Neither  is  the  charm  of  letters  as  a 
pursuit,  and  as  a  labor  that  brings  its  own  reward,  all-suffi 
cient  to  sustain  the  scholar.  If  his  intellectual  and  sensitive 
nature  are  excited  and  elevated  by  the  trump  of  fame,  or 
soothed  into  delight  by  study  and  meditation,  yet  he  has 
another  nature  to  take  care  of,  to  neglect  which  wilfully  is  to 
commit  a  scarcely  justifiable  suicide. 

An  amateur  in  almost  every  walk  is  regarded  as  much 
inferior  to  a  working  member  of  the  craft.  A  man  rarely 
puts  his  heart  or  invests  the  whole  stock  of  his  faculties  in 
a  pursuit  which  he  takes  up  casually  to  while  away  an  hour 
or  two  of  an  idle  day.  Such  writers  do  not  seem  properly 
ever  to  become  amenable  to  criticism.  You  are  never  sure 
whether  they  are  doing  their  best  or  not ;  as  a  member  of 
the  fancy  might  say,  they  do  not  appear  to  come  up  to  the 
scratch.  They  fence  with  foils  blunted  at  the  end,  and  dread 
the  naked  weapon ;  or  they  are  like  shots  who  practise  with 
powder  only.  "  These  paper  pellets  of  the  brain "  are  too 
much  for  them. 

In  our  literary  world  in  this  country,  there  is  no  lack  in 
point  of  numbers  of  amateur  authors.  They  are  generally 
either  quiet  young  men,  sons  of  wealthy  men,  "  who  pen 
a  stanza  while  they  should  engross;"  or  else  men  in  the 
meridian  of  life,  who  affect  the  notoriety  of  fashionable 
authorship.  They  are  young  poets  or  middle-aged  novel 
ists;  writers  of  essays  in  reviews,  and  of  sketches  for  the 
magazines.  Sometimes  they  translate  tales  or  travels  for 
the  weekly  extras.  They  deliver  an  occasional  lecture,  and 
contribute  articles  for  the  newspapers.  Their  names  are 


AMATEUR   AUTHORS    AND    SMALL    CRITICS.  181 

often  better  known  than  their  productions;  they  live  in 
cliques,  herd  in  clubs  and  coteries,  and  puff  each  other  inor 
dinately.  Their  reputation  is  formed  by  an  echo  reverbe 
rating  their  self-praise.  When  rich,  they  are  the  most 
desperate  of  critics,  as  above  dependence,  and  out  of  the 
reach  of  appeal  and  censure. 

There  are  certain  marks  by  which  you  may  infallibly 
know  the  amateur  author.  He  is  always  declaiming  against 
the  pecuniary  profits  of  literature,  though  we  doubt  whether 
he  would  venture  to  carry  out  the  same  doctrine  in  matters 
of  business,  or  in  his  luxurious  recreations  of  a  less  spiritual 
description.  He  lives  on  his  own  estate  or  income,  but  on 
other  people's  ideas.  He  gives  for  love  what  he  pilfers 
through  mean  ambition.  He  is  the  less  conscientious  on  this 
point,  as  his  labors  bring  him  in  no  returns.  Yet  we  have 
known  those  who  pretend  to  write  only  for  amusement,  to 
come  to  that  pass  as  to  be  not  a  little  solicitous  to  procure 
remuneration.  Such  boasters  we  have  known  refused  any 
assistance  4n  their  literary  schemes  ;  and,  not  to  be  harsh,  we 
think  they  deserve  the  humiliation,  at  least,  of  temporary 
neglect. 

Amateur  writers  rarely  undertake  works  of  length  or  re 
search  ;  and  yet  they  are  very  apt  to  take  a  writer  to  task 
who  devotes  himself  to  literary  occupation  in  the  minor 
classic  forms  of  writing.  Unable  themselves  to  write  good 
magazine  papers,  and  reading  (as  they  must)  many  inferior 
ones,  they  confuse  good  and  bad  together.  They  endeavor 
to  catch  the  high  tone  of  criticism,  and  while  mispraising 
daubs  of  historical  pieces,  pass  by  with  ignorant  scorn  the 
most  delicate  miniature  sketches  of  manners,  or  vivid  por 
traits  of  character. 

They  injure  the  true  author,  who  unites  a  love  for  his  pro- 


182  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

fession,  deep  interest  in  his  subject,  and  an  honest  independ 
ence,  with  the  aim  of  procuring  a  sufficient  livelihood.  If 
writings  are  to  be  procured  for  nothing,  nothing  will  be  paid. 
Cheapness,  not  merit,  will  become  the  object  of  publishers, 
and  the  deterioration  of  literature  must  infallibly  ensue.  The 
value  of  a  thing  has  been  stated  (somewhat  sophistically)  to 
be  what  it  will  bring.  This  has  by  no  means  been  an  uni 
versal  or  a  just  test  in  literary  productions,  for  the  flimsiest 
of  which  the  highest  prices  are  paid.  What  could  Bacon 
get  now-a-days  if  he  sent  his  essays  to  the  magazines  ?  His 
late  (and  successful)  imitator,  doubtless,  would  realize  little 
more. 

Few  amateur  authors  feel  any  real  sympathy  for  literary 
men.  There  is  no  fellow-feeling  existing  between  the  indus 
trious  and  ardent  scholar,  and  the  lively  voluptuary  and  gen 
teel  wit.  Independence  of  literary  profits  causes  indifference, 
and  sometimes  an  ill-concealed  contempt.  Are  the  hard 
toil,  the  misappreciated  aims,  the  uncertain  gains  of  a  writer 
mentioned,  they  are  heard  with  coolness,  and  ansvflered  by  a 
shrug.  Want  of  money  appears  want  of  moral  principle  or 
of  respectability.  They  dread  duns,  poor  authors,  unpopular 
poets.  Fame  and  a  garret  are  the  topics  of  their  heartless 
ridicule.  An  amateur  author  is,  in  a  word,  an  amphibioua 
sort  of  creature — out  of  the  pale  of  true  writers,  and  yet 
classed  by  all  with  the  mob  of  scribblers.  They  decry  their 
own  writings,  with  more  of  truth  than  they  are  aware  of ; 
and  ironically  pronounce  their  own  eulogy  in  the  censure  of 
another.  They  are  bitter  bad  judges  of  others  ;  and  the 
most  ingenious  of  egotists.  They  turn  self-tormentors  to  be 
idolized  by  the  public  :  they  offer  themselves  up,  on  the 
shrine  of  their  egregious  self-love,  a  willing  sacrifice,  and  in 
order  to  propitiate  popular  regard.  To  the  above  sweeping 


AMATEUR    AUTHORS    AND    SMALL    CRITICS.  183 

charges,  certain  exceptions  are  to  be  made.  Most  of  the 
better  description  of  amateur  authors  would  translate  better 
into  friendly  critics,  liberal  patrons,  and  unpretending  lovers 
of  literature.  In  modern  times,  an  amateur  author  of  genius 
is  next  to  an  anomaly.  The  labors  of  such  a  man  cannot  be 
repaid  by  mere  popularity.  Even  the  great  poets  of  this 
century  have  obtained  large  sums  for  their  MSS.  Scott  is  a 
notable  instance  ;  but  it  were  well  for  letters  that  few  amass 
the  fortune  of  the  great  novelist.  Yet,  from  Shakspeare  to 
Wordsworth,  the  poets  have  been  at  least  comfortably  pro 
vided  for,  being  gifted  with  a  reasonable  share  of  prudence — 
an  eye  to  the  main  chance. 

From  amateur  authors  we  pass  to  small  critics,  a  natural 
transition,  as  these  form  a  division  of  the  same  general  class. 
Like  the  first,  they  are  rarely  writers  by  profession,  though 
we  have  Dennises  and  Giffords  in  the  craft.  Generally,  the 
small  critic  is  an  unblushing  pretender,  without  the  slightest 
claims  to  respect.  He  is  to  the  great  critic,  the  original 
judge,  what  the  minute  philosopher  is  to  Plato  or  Bacon. 
He  is  great  in  little  things,  and  conversely  little  in  great 
things.  His  genius  is  bent  on  investigating  trifles.  He  is  an 
ingenious  perverter  of  sense,  from  blindness  at  not  seeing  the 
printer's  blunders,  or  a  rapid  writer's  slips  in  orthography. 
He  is  strongest  in  punctuation  and  prosody.  If  an  editor, 
he  is  in  moral  dread  of  lively  contributors,  mistaking  a  satire 
on  vice  for  a  condemnation  of  virtue,  and  a  homily  on  hypo 
crisy  for  a  burlesque  on  religion.  Of  poetry  he  is  the  verbal 
critic,  and  from  his  literalness,  spoils  the  beauty  of  a  fine 
passage  because  he  cannot  see  the  fitness  of  a  choice  epithet. 
Correctness  is  the  height  of  his  ambition.  He  remarks  how 
many  lines  in  a  poem  end  with  a  monosyllable,  or  with  a 
similar  termination.  He  pretends  to  be  skilful  in  metres  and 


184  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

the  art  of  poetry.  By  this  he  intends  the  rules  of  Aristotle, 
and  Bossu,  and  Blair,  and  not  the  divine  instincts  of  the 
glorious  Afflatus.  But  he  does  by  no  means  invariably 
enunciate  his  judgment  in  print :  he  oftener  talks  than  writes 
criticism.  In  a  private  circle  he  affects  the  dictatorship  of 
letters.  If  he  has  a  relation,  a  man  of  talent,  he  patronizes 
him  as  a  respectable  writer.  Trash  is  his  favorite  term  for 
all  he  cannot  understand,  and  especially  for  all  keen  satire 
that  he  suspects  may  have  a  bearing  upon  himself.  He 
makes  the  most  egregious  blunders,  saying,  this  will  not  last, 
of  an  immortal  work  !  or,  he  will  soon  break  down,  of  a  man 
whose  noble  enthusiasm  appears  to  his  contracted  soul  little 
better  than  midsummer  madness. 

The  small  critic  is  delighted  with  petty  beauties  and  the 
minutest  details.  He  loves  still  more  to  carp  on  petty  faults 
in  a  great  man,  and  thinks  he  makes  a  fine  discovery  when 
he  meets  a  trivial  flaw.  He  looks,  as  it  were,  through  an  in 
verted  telescope,  and  to  his  eye  great  objects  diminish,  He 
makes  great  things  appear  small,  and  the  little  less.  His 
ideas  are  on  the  descending  scale ;  his  eyes  contract  to  a 
mere  point  of  littleness  ;  he  is  the  critic  of  Lilliput. 

Originality  puts  him  out ;  boldness  he  styles  extrava 
gance,  and  acknowledges  none  but  imitative  excellence.  All 
inventors  he  looks  upon  as  arrogant  interlopers.  He  is  dis 
trustful  of  novelty,  and  apprehends  failure  in  every  new 
scheme.  He  cannot  distinguish  between  freshness  of  feeling 
and  affectation.  He  has  a  horror  of  individuality,  and  will 
not  allow  the  weight  of  personal  impressions.  Strong  passion 
he  accounts  a  weak  prejudice,  and  the  sincere  convictions  of  a 
pure  spirit  "  idols  of  the  cave."  Indignation  at  meanness 
and  a  scorn  of  rascality,  he  terms  "  whimwhams  and  pre 
judice." 


I  AMATEUR    AUTHORS    AND    SMALL    CRITICS.  185 

As  he  is  a  trite  critic  and  a  stale  theorist,  so  is  he  also  a 
false  logician.  He  is,  indeed,  a  mere  special  pleader.  He 
cavils  at  literal  mistakes,  and  disputes  terms  rather  than  ab 
stract  truths.  He  is  a  newspaper  Thomas  Aquinas,  or  the 
Duns  Scotus  of  a  monthly.  Magazines  he  is  apt  to  hold  in 
supreme  contempt,  though  for  his  life  he  cannot  write  a 
decent  article  for  one.  Voluminous  works  awe  him  into 
silence.  Erudition  is  to  him  the  greatest  of  bugbears.  Lest 
he  should  be  discovered  as  an  ignoramus,  he  never  pretends 
to  discredit  the  pretences  of  pedantry.  He  swells  the  train 
of  such  by  his  pomp  and  boasting.  Since  he  has  no  genuine 
acquirements,  he  cannot  distinguish  the  false  wares,  and 
consequently  equally  applauds  the  jewel  and  the  mock  paste 

Small  critics  may  be  found  among  two  classes  of  people, 
in  greater  abundance  than  anywhere  else ;  among  so-called 
sensible  people,  who  have  no  real  pretensions  to  letters,  though 
they  affect  to  speak  critically  on  all  points,  and  mere  biblio 
graphers,  makers  of  catalogues,  collectors,  booksellers  and 
auctioneers.  People  of  sense  in  ordinary  matters,  and  men 
intelligent  in  their  own  walk  of  life,  but  who  have  never 
received  any  tincture  of  literature,  make  the  most  opinionated 
of  all  critics.  A  carpenter  expects  to  graduate  the  powers  of 
the  human  mind,  and  a  stone  mnson  to  overthrow  one  of 
Ariosto's  castles.  Thinking  to  bring  everything  to  a  common 
standard,  the  illiterate  imagine  themselves  to  be  as  good 
judges  of  right  and  wrong  in  morals,  as  of  the  beautiful  and 
odious  in  aesthetics.  Thej  are  keen  at  a  bargain,  and  confide 
without  doubt  in  their  own  decisions  on  works  of  genius 
The  same  people  who  talk  pertly  of  Milton  and  Wordsworth 
would  think  it  absurd  for  a  blacksmith  to  attempt  to  take  a 
watch  to  pieces.  Yet  the  difference  of  difficulty,  between  the 
two  operations,  is  by  no  means  great.  And,  after  all,  the 


186  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

immediate  popularity  of  most  writers  rests  chiefly  upon  such 
readers  as  these ;  the  worthy,  fit  audience,  though  few,  finally 
give  reputation.  Meanwhile,  however,  the  mob  of  readers 
follow  established  names  and  reigning  fashions ;  they  follow 
their  chosen  leaders  with  implicit  credulity. 

Bibliographic  critics  are  learned  in  title  pages,  indexes, 
editions.  Their  judgments  are  traditional;  their  opinions 
hereditary.  They  think  by  proxy,  and  talk  by  rote.  One  of 
this  sort  reads  everything  and  feels  nothing ;  he  is  a  walking 
catalogue ;  a  peripatetic  companion  to  the  library  ;  he  knows 
the  names  of  all  the  authors  that  have  lived.  "  In  books,  not 
authors,  studious  is  my  lord."  Yet  such  is  a  useful  character ; 
a  guide  to  the  literary  voyager ;  a  conductor  of  the  literary 
diligence.  He  is  well  in  his  place  if  he  will  only  remain 
quietly  in  it ;  but  the  difficulty  is  to  keep  him  there. 


XXVI. 

FEMALE  NOVELISTS.  * 

THE  real  genius  of  the  female  mind,  in  two  classes  of  prose 
fiction,  appears  to  be  universally  confessed, — in  the  deline 
ation  of  the  artificial  in  manners,  and  the  natural  in  sentiment : 
in  the  novel  of  manners,  as  Evelina ;  and  in  the  novel  of 
sentiment,  as  the  Simple  Story.  Ridicule  and  pathos,  these 
furnish  the  appropriate  weapons,  and  occupy  the  legitimate 
provinces  of  the  female  novelist.  In  these  departments  they 
reign  supreme.  Manly  writers  may  have  at  their  command 
a  wider  vocabulary  of  indignant  sarcasm  or  exhibit  profounder 

*  1844. 


FEMALE    NOVELISTS.  187 

views  of  character :  may  paint  an  absurdity  in  more  glowing 
colors,  and  more  grotesque  forms,  or  display  a  superior  ex 
uberance  of  comic  fancy ;  but  they  cannot  trifle  with  such 
abandon  and  ease  as  a  female  wit :  their  wit  may  carry  more 
weight,  but  it  is  less  bright  and  cutting  than  a  woman's. 
Men  reason  better,  but  they  cannot  rally  so  well ,  and  raillery, 
in  ordinary  talk,  bears  the  palm  from  ratiocination.  Mas 
culine  satire  is  best  adapted  for  dissection  of  character  and 
real  things,  and  not  so  well  fitted  for  depicting  mannerisms. 
Women  observe  and  note  all  the  varieties  of  the  genus 
odity,  more  readily  than  men  ;  and  with  a  certain  instinctive 
nicety  of  taste  and  discrimination,  they  describe  the  varying 
and  almost  imperceptible  shades  of  manners.  From  an 
educated  sense  of  propriety  in  behavior,  and  the  restraints  of 
decorum  and  etiquette,  they  are  rendered  more  critical 
judges  of  the  nice  observances  of  polite  breeding,  and  the 
opposite  gaucheries  of  an  impolite  or  rustic  bearing.  Mere 
external  minutiae  engage  their  attention  so  much  as  to  beget 
an  almost  pedantic  regard  for  certain  forms  of  society,  and  a 
horror  of  all  solecisms,  which  they  almost  rank  with  criminal 
offences.  They  are,  for  this  reason,  perfectly  at  home  either 
in  criticising  or  describing  the  persons  or  events  of  a  ball-room, 
the  boudoir,  theatre,  concert,  or  saloon.  With  a  quick  eye 
they  note  each  and  every  deviation  from  the  existing  code  of 
fashion,  whether  it  be  in  dress,  manners  or  conversation.  So 
much  for  the  satirical  powers  of  the  sex. 

A  similar  analogy  holds  in  respect  to  the  talent  for  sen 
timental  description.  Great  poets,  like  Shakspeare,  and 
painters  of  man,  as  Fielding,  for  instance,  deal  more  with  the 
passions  than  the  sentiments,  which  require  finer  handling, 
to  borrow  a  phrase  from  the  artist.  A  middle  range,  between 
high  passion  and  indifference,  the  pathos  of  domestic  tragedy, 


188  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

the  prose  imagination  of  the  poet,  depicting  scenes  of  ordinary 
or  even  of  humble  life,  appear  to  fall  within  the  sphere  of 
female  genius.  Few  masculine  writers  (even  among  poets) 
have  (^one  full  justice  to  the  noblest  spescimen  of  the  female 
character,  whilst,  at  the  same  time,  it  must  be  confessed  that 
no  female  painter  has  ever  been  able  to  grasp  very  many  traits 
of  the  characters  of  men,  or  to  realize  the  immense  discre 
pancies  between  the  different  ranks.  The  best  women  are 
ignorant,  practically,  of  the  lowest  forms  of  humanity  (still 
noble  in  the  most  utter  degradation) ;  and  those  who  are  such 
cannot  throw  any  light  upon  the  subject  from  their  own  pens. 
Whole  classes  of  society  are  thus  excluded  from  the  vision 
of  the  fair  author,  and  the  motley  manners  of  many  men. 
We  have  had  no  female  Ulysses  or  Homer.  At  the  same 
time  there  is,  nevertheless,  a  wide  field  to  be  explored,  of 
private  history  and  domestic  life.  There  are  the  manifold 
windings  of  the  female  heart  to  be  threaded  (an  Arachne's 
web) ;  there  is  the  beautiful  nature  of  childhood  to  unfold, 
the  growing  beauty  of  the  womanly  maiden  ;  and  the  proper 
audience  (of  readers)  is  composed  of  characters  of  the  same 
stamp,  sweet  children,  innocent  girlhood,  fair  virginity, 
womanly  beauty,  inspiring  love.  From  the  bud  to  the  full 
blown  flower,  from  her  offspring  (with  its  opening  mind  and 
inquisitive  tongue),  to  the  lovely  creature  that  bore  it,  a  pre 
cious  burden ;  from  these  come  the  lessons  of  life,  to  these 
they  are  properly  addressed,  and  by  one  of  themselves.  Yes  ! 
women  write  for  women,  and  so  they  should  :  let  men  ex 
plore  the  baser  parts  of  human  nature  ;  let  it  be  their  business 
(a  hateful  task)  to  torture  the  guilty  soul  into  penitence,  re 
ligion,  and  virtue.  It  is  for  women  to  weave  garlands  of 
immortal  beauty  for  the  brow  of  goodness  and  happy  duty; 
and  to  wreathe  chaplets  for  the  crowning  graces  of  the  con- 


FEMALE    NOVELISTS.  189 

fiding,  the  affectionate,  and  the  pure.  By  way  of  illustrating 
the  above  remarks,  we  shall,  in  particular,  proceed  to  notice 
the  fictions  of  Madame  d'Arblay  and  Mrs.  Inchbald,  who 
stand  foremost  in  the  two  classes  wo  have  undertaken  to 
describe.  We  shall  reserve  a  page  or  two  for  Mrs.  Sheridan 
and  Miss  Bremer,  not  forgetting  an  incidental  notice  of  other 
female  writers  of  eminence  in  the  same  department. 

First,  however;  of  the  two  classical  painters  we  mentioned, 
the  latter  of  whom  we  place  at  the  head  of  all  female  novel 
ists  and  prose  writers,  for  qualities  both  of  head  and  heart, 
which  rarely  meet  in  union.     Many  of  our  fair  readers  may 
have*  to  be  told  that  these  capital  writers  were  the  peculiar 
favorites  of  their  day ;  though  we  dare  to  say  that  by  the 
class   for  whom   their  works  were  written  and  appropriately 
addressed,  they  are  almost  entirely  unknown.      This  is  more 
particularly  the  case  with  regard  to  the  present  generation  of 
readers.     Old  ladies  and  ladies  of  a  certain  age,  have  thumb 
ed  Camilla  and  the  Simple  Story,  aye,  and  well.     Yet,  while 
the  modern  lady  has  every  new  novel  on  her  table,  we  seldom 
see  the  Simple  Story ;  never  Nature  and  Art,  more  frequent 
ly  Evelina,  and  Cecilia  hardly  at  all.     We  trust  these  sug 
gestions  may  not  be  wholly  profitless,  but  induce  a  return  to 
those  standard  productions,  not  only  unsurpassed   but  un 
equalled  by  any  attempts  of  the  kind  at  present.     None  of 
the  fashionable  novelists  of  our  present  era  can  hit  off  a  city 
fop  like  Miss  Burney,  or  melt  the  heart  with  no  unfeigned 
emotion  like  the  creator  of  Miss  Milner,  and  Dorriforth,  and 
Sandford.     There  is  a  smartness,  a  shrewdness  of  observation 
in  the  authoress  of  Evelina,  to  which  neither  Lady  Blessing- 
ton,  nor  Mrs.  Gore,  nor  any  writer  of  her  school,  can  lay  any 
pretensions.     Neither  do  we  possess  in  English,  at  the  pre 
sent  moment,  a  writer  who  can  excite  our  indignation  of 


190  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

time-serving  in  the  bishop,  and  hypocritical  severity  in  the 
unjust  judge ;  who  can  quicken  our  admiration  of  fortitude, 
patience,  and  noble  generosity,  or  smite  the  heart  with  a 
weight  of  melancholy  anguish  at  the  untimely  fate  of  the 
poor  victim  of  sin  in  power  and  "  the  pride  of  place,"  as  the 
admirable  writer  of  Nature  and  Art.  The  more  popular  ma 
terial  of  which  Miss  Burney's  works  are  composed  may  have 
preserved  them  from  oblivion,  but  the  matter  is  of  an  inferior 
cast. 

She  is  perfectly  successful  where  only  smartness  and 
shrewd  perception  are  requisite.  In  the  philosophy  of  the 
heart,  she  is  quite  deficient.  Affectation,  conventional  pro 
priety,  and  mawkish  sensibility,  usurp  the  place  of  real  mo 
desty  and  genuine  feeling.  Her  forte  lies  in  ridicule  of  igno 
rant  assumption,  and  especially  of  cockney  pretensions.  She 
is  the  satirist  of  Cockayne,  and  dwells  so  much  in  this  re 
gion,  that  we  are  apt  to  suspect  it  to  be  her  favorite  locality. 
A  writer  or  talker  rarely  rises  above  an  absurdity  which  he 
or  she  is  continually  harping  upon ;  and  affected  disgust  not 
unfrequently  conceals  a  genuine  sympathy.  The  painter  of 
the  Branghtons  had  something  of  the  same  narrowness  of 
views  and  petty  ambition  that  distinguished  her  fictitious 
characters.  And  what  we  always  inferred,  from  the  internal 
evidence  of  her  works,  we  find  abundantly  confirmed  in  the 
memoirs  of  this  clever  woman,  lately  published,  in  which  it 
is  almost  inconceivable  to  discover  what  a  compound  of  small 
sins  represented  the  social  nature  of  Miss  Burney.  A  moral 
coxcomb,  a  pedantic  courtier,  an  affected  wit,  an  insipid  com 
panion,  her  autobiographical  notes,  can  leave  no  other  im 
pression  than  that  of  inspiring  an  honest  contempt  for  this 
frivolous,  flattered,  yet^  enslaved,  minion  of  fortune.  If  this 
criticism  appear  harsh,  we  appeal  directly  to  the  volumes 


FEMALE    NOVELISTS.  191 

in  question,  where  the  data  for  a  correct  judgment  are 
abundant. 

We  would  speak  and  write  in  quite  a  different  tone  of 
that  peerless  woman,  Mrs.  Inchbald — admirable  not  only  for 
her  writings,  but  also  for  her  personal  character  and  the 
beauty  of  her  daily  life  ;  an  actress  of  fascinating  beauty  and 
attractive  grace,  yet 

"  Chaste  as  the  icicle, 

That's  cruded  by  the  frost  from  purest  enow, 
»     And  Jiangs  on  Dian's  temple  :" 

amid  the  splendid  temptations  and  pleasures  offered  by  the 
admirers  of  the  stage  to  its  heroines  ;  a  noble-hearted  woman 
struggling  with  poverty  to  accumulate  a  comfortable  inde 
pendence  for  her  poor  relations ;  sitting  without  a  fire,  the 
cold  winter  through,  to  procure  fuel  for  a  sister — an  act  of 
Christian  charity  worthy  of  a  saint;  and,  in  her  entire  con 
duct,  exhibiting  a  spirit  of  love  and  self-denial  that  cannot 
be  too  highly  lauded.  Neither  should  we  forget  her  greatest 
fault,  most  pardonable  and  innocent  in  her,  the  early  coquetry 
with  which  she  has  been  charged,  and  some  of  the  romantic 
freaks  of  her  girlish  days,  recorded  by  the  dullest  of  biogra 
phers,  the  dull  and  voluminous  Boaden.  Her  later  romance 
was  of  a  deep  and  melancholy  cast ;  her  love  for  a  married 
man,  Dr.  Warren,  in  its  whole  history,  pure  and  unsullied, 
and  her  grief  at  his  death.  Leigh  Hunt  has  done  noble  jus 
tice  to  her  life  and  memory,  in  a  paper  of  the  Seer.  Her 
writings  were  fresh  draughts  of  vivid  experience  of  life.  We 
apprehend  a  portion  of  early  biography,  in  parts  of  the  career 
of  Miss  Milner  and  the  inflexible,  yet  benevolent,  Sanford,  is 
a  portrait  instinct  with  truth.  Mrs.  Inchbald  has,  in  our 
judgment,  surpassed  all  females  writers  in  delineating  the 


192  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

passion  of  love,  as  it  is  frequently  seen  ;  and  though  more 
elevated  or  more  profound  masters  of  the  human  heart 
could,  unquestionably,  surpass  any  attempt  of  hers  to  display 
the  whole  resources  of  the  passion  in  men,  yet  no  masculine 
writer  could,  by  any  possibility,  excel  in  fidelity,  naturalness 
and  exquisite  discernment,  the  finished  portrait  of  Miss  Mil- 
ner,  the  capricious,  affectionate,  coquettish,  yot  obedient, 
ward ;  the  half-spoiled  child  of  fortune,  at  last  humbled  to 
the  dust  and  breathing  out  the  last  sighs  of  penitence,  at 
tended  by  the  friend  and  censor  of  her  youth.  All  the 
characters  in  the  Simple  Story  are  admirably  drawn ;  the 
haughty  and  austere  Dorriforth ;  that  noble,  rough,  true 
Christian,  Sandford,  a  severe  censor  while  he  thought  cen- 
eure  called  for,  but  melting  with  benevolence  at  the  sick  bed 
of  the  repentant  worldling.  Miss  Woodley  is  one  of  the 
most  sensible  and  truly  feminine  of  our  author's  characters. 
"  Nature  and  Art"  should  be  read  by  every  young  man  and 
woman,  impressing,  as  it  does,  an  indignant  scorn  of  the  cur 
rent  hypocrisies,  the  legalized  villany,  the  conventional  mo 
rality  of  men  of  the  world,  and  of  the  customs  of  society. 
The  style  and  execution  of  these  novels  is  classic ;  graceful 
and  fluent,  a  study  and  a  model.  The  supreme  power  of 
the  author  lies  in  pathetic  situation  and  nobleness  of  senti 
ment,  alternately.  Few  scenes  in  any  work  of  fiction  can 
compare,  for  deep  interest,  with  the  trial  scene  in  the  second 
novel.  As  a  beacon  to  those  captivated  by  the  fame  of  a 
fashionable  coquette,  we  recommend  the  sad  history  of  the 
ill-fated  Miss  Milner.  To  encourage  the  love  of  virtue,  we 
would  point  to  the  characters  of  the  elder  and  younger  Hen 
ry  (father  and  son).  In  a  word,  the  moral  value  of  these  ad 
mirable  works  is,  at  least,  equal  to  the  breathless  interest 
they  excite  as  works  of  fiction. 


FEMALE    NOVELISTS.  193 

Several  female  writers  maintain  a  respectable  rank  in  the 
same  department  with  the  two  writers  whose  merits  have  been 
above  discussed ;  whilst  there  are  others  excellent  in  an  in 
ferior  grade.  Amongst  forgotten  writers  and  books,  we  may 
mention  the  History  of  David  Simple,  by  a  relation  of  Field 
ing  (if  we  are  not  mistaken),  and  a  woman  of  fine  sense  and 
feeling,  the  mistress  of  a  refined  and  simple  style ;  the  pleas 
ing  fictions  of  the  authoress  of  Emily  Montague,  and  Sidney 
Biddulph,  a  novel  by  Mrs.  Sheridan,  the  wife  of  Dr.  John 
son's  old  rival,  the  niece-in-law  of  Swift's  friend,  and  the  mo 
ther  of  Richard  Brinsley.  Dr.  Johnson  is  reported  to  have 
said  of  this  lady,  that  she  had  hardly  a  right  to  make  her 
readers  suffer  so  much :  that  he  thought  she  exercised  her 
power  of  raising  the  feelings  of  compassion  and  sympathy  for 
the  distresses  of  others  to  too  high  a  pitch. 

The  great  number  of  female  novelists,  during  the  present 
century,  is  a  feature  in  the  literary  character  of  the  age  to  be 
noted.  To  run  over  the  mere  names  would  prove  a  tedious 
and  profitless  labor ;  but  we  may  advert  to  a  few— the  strong, 
practical  sense  of  Edgeworth,  adapted  to  moral  tales  for  the 
young — of  Opie  and  Moore  to  impress  religious  principle  as 
well.  The  pleasant  village  histories  of  Mitford  ;  the  shrewd 
speculations  (best  in  her  early  sketches)  of  Martineau ;  the 
wild  and  brilliant  imagination  of  Mrs.  Shelley,  and  the  more 
quiet  and  agreeable  attempts  of  Mary  Ilowitt  (the  English 
Sedgwick).  From  a  large  number  of  elegant-minded  female 
writers  of  our  own  country,  we  may  select  two  women  of  pure 
genius,  as  the  best  examples  of  American  female  talent,  Miss 
Sedgwick  and  Mrs.  Kirkland,  women  of  whom  any  country 
might  be  proud. 

Since  writing   the  above,    we   have  fallen  upon,   by  the 
merest  chance,  a  copy  of  Sidney  Biddulph,  to  which  we  must 
9 


194  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

devote  a  page  or  two,  worthy  as  it  is  of  a  much  more  extended 
notice.  This  is  an  admirable  novel  of  the  serious  kind,  a  true 
picture  of  domestic  life,  and  fraught  with  a  certain  classic 
grace,  by  a  remarkably  sweet  and  elegant  woman,  who  de 
serves  to  be  much  better  known.  As  a  mere  specimen  of 
style  and  artful  narrative,  it  is  worthy  of  preservation,  to  say 
nothing  of  the  deeply  interesting  incidents  of  the  story  and 
the  varied  characters  themselves.  Yet,  for  our  own  part,  we 
read  the  book  less  for  the  story  and  plot  than  for  the  senti 
ment  and  reflections  it  contains ;  and,  in  general,  we  care 
little  for  the  very  portion  of  a  prose  fiction  that  most  interests 
the  majority  of  readers.  It  is  for  this  reason,  among  others, 
we  are  such  admirers  of  Miss  Bremer's  novels,  which  are  voted 
tame  by  lovers  of  the  stimulating  and  highly-wrought  tales  of 
blood  and  terror.  A  sensible  old  sea  captain  of  our  acquaint 
ance  thinks  some  portions  of  the  Swedish  novels  are  even 
"  puerile ;"  and  an  acute,  most  discerning  legal  gentleman 
can  see  nothing  at  all  in  them.  Ah  !  better  to  read  a  chap- 
tar  of  simple  domestic  history  than  records  of  crime  and  vio 
lence.  By  morbid  sympathy,  a  weak  mind  readily  becomes 
a  convert  to  admiration  of  desperadoes  aud  captivating  vil 
lains  ;  while,  by  a  natural  and  healthy  process,  the  virtuous 
mind  receives  new  vigor  from  pure  thought  and  the  unambi 
tious  details  of  contented  domesticity.  An  intellect  that  has 
become  enfeebled  by  the  extravagant  demands  upon  it  of 
Spagnialetto  painters  of  vice  and  wretchedness,  is  nourished 
and  strenghtened  by  scenes  of  rational  happiness  and  exam 
ples  of  retiring  and  private  nobleness.  The  moral  of  Sidney 
Biddulph  is  one  by  no  means  agreeable  to  the  mere  novel- 
reader,  or  to  one  ignorant  of  life,  who  invariably  expects  to 
see  virtue  rewarded  and  vice  punished,  either  at  the  end  of  a 
play  or  a  novel,  or  at  the  conclusion  of  this  human  existence  ; 


FEMALE    NOVELISTS.  195 

but  a  very  mortifying  yet  most  just  conclusion,  so  neatly  ex- 
pressed  by  the  authoress  herself,  that  we  borrow  her  language, 
"  that  neither  prudence,  forethought,  nor  even  the  best  dispo 
sition  that  the  human  heart  is  capable  of,  are,  of  themselves, 
sufficient  to  defend  us  against  the  inevitable  ills  that  some 
times  are  allotted  even  to  the  best ;"  or,  as  Shirley  despon 
dently  sings,  "  there  is  no  armour  against  fate  !"  more  wisely, 
perhaps,  we  should  say  Providence,  that  "  bringeth  good  out 
of  evil." 

We  have  alluded  to  Miss  Bremer :  it  were  an  act  of  injus 
tice  to  do  no  more,  and  we  feel  it  a  matter  of  duty  to  add 
our  slight  tribute  to  the  incense  wafted  across  the  wide  ocean 
to  that  northern  land  of  the  Sagas,  ot  Vasa  and  Adolphus 
of  Oxensteirn  and  Christina,  of  Charles  XII.  and  Bishop 
Tegner.  This  we  gladly  pay.  Miss  Bremer  is  the  most  pro 
minent  writer  of  the  day,  in  her  peculiar  department  of  fiction 
in  pictures  of  home-life  and  domestic  manners,  lively  and  gen. 
uine.  Her  admirable  Swedish  novels  are  not  only  national 
works,  but  fitted  for  all  lands.  This  admirable  writer  has 
been  compared  to  Miss  Edge  worth,  whom  she  surpasses  in 
sentimental  description  and  delicate  fancy.  The  Swedish 
novelist  is  a  livelier  and  more  dramatic  painter  than  the  Irish 
wit,  who  is  a  woman  of  sound,  rather  than  of  fine,  sense. 
Miss  Bremer  is  much  the  deeper  writer,  sees  further  into  hu 
man  nature,  has  more  versatility ;  sometimes  startling  and 
philosophic,  yet,  in  general,  cheerful  and  piquant ;  a  moral 
poet  of  the  fireside,  with  some  resemblance  to  Cowper  and  the 
homelier  pathos  of  Wordsworth.  Her  "  musa  pedestris"  is 
heightened,  not  unfrequently,  by  an  infusion  of  German  fancy, 
and  deepened  by  the  serious  and  noble  thoughtl'ulness  of  that 
melancholy  Northland.  Though  the  scenery,  the  landscape, 
the  background  of  the  Swedish  novels  is  comparatively  new 


196  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

to  us,  known  only  before  in  the  pages  of  the  magnificent 
Tegner  and  the  tasteful  Longfellow,  yet  the  characters  are  as 
familiar  as  those  we  meet  every  day. 

Who  has  not  known  personages  of  age,  distinction,  and  fa 
mily,  like  th-e  President,  the  Colonel,  the  Judge,  conservatives 
of  the  best  class,  sticklers  for  dogmas  and  usages  ?  yet  men 
of  clear  heads,  obscured  by  few  prejudices  of  education  or  so 
ciety — respectable  characters,  worthy  citizens  ;  all  little  fitted 
for  our  country,  in  a  political  point  of  view,  since  they  form 
timid  statesmen  and  with  habits  of  narrow  diplomacy.  Then, 
again,  we  have  often  seen  headstrong  cornets,  pining  students, 
romantic  schoolmasters,  like  the  heroes  of  the  second  rank  in 
the  same  works.  The  old  ladies  are  equally  well  made  out — 
whether  stately  widows  of  condition,  the  relicts  of  distinguish 
ed  officials ;  old  maids,  chatty  and  active  ;  or  matronly  dames, 
most  worthy  and  excellent.  The  young  women  generally 
partake  of  the  species  Sylphide,  and  have  a  certain  aerial 
grace  and  softness.  In  each  novel,  wo  have  to  remark  the  re 
currence  of  these  different  types  of  character.  The  writer 
herself  generally  figures  as  the  relator :  in  the  Neighbors,  she 
js  the  doctor's  wife ;  in  the  President's  Daughters,  she  is  the 
Governess ;  in  all,  she  is  a  friend  of  the  family,  and  ranks 
as  one  of  the  useful  and  agreeable  among  the  poorer  rela 
tions. 

A  wide  range  of  character  and  variety  of  situation  and  in 
cident,  mark  the  Swedish  novels,  which,  besides  the  higher 
qualities  we  have  claimed  for  them,  are  extremely  agreeable 
for  the  essay-matter,  the  speculation  and  thought  they  con 
tain,  no  less  than  for  the  playful  humor  and  genial  Flemish 
distinctness  which  characterize  the  same  scenes.  The  beauty 
of  naturalness  we  further  notice,  and  of  characters  for  the 
most  part,  one  cannot  avoid  liking  or  sympathizing  with.  In 


FEMAMK    NOVELISTS.  197 

the  last,  Strife  and  Peace,  we  do  not  recollect  a  harsh  (not 
to  say  worthless)  character.*  This,  for  many  readers,  is  an 
advantage.  The  student  of  human  nature  must  see  all  men  ; 
but  many  should  learn  only  the  best  characters,  as  they  want 
strength  and  penetration  to  see  the  good  in  the  evil.  The 
end,  the  tone,  the  moral  of  these  works  is  pure  and  healthy ; 
with  no  vitiating  influences,  no  corrupting  suggestions.  But 
most  excellent,  if  only  read  to  cherish  right  and  noble  feelings, 
and  confirm  good  and  high  principles. 

Mrs.  Emily  Flygare  (is  not  this  -possibly  a  nom  de 
plume,  or  synonyme  of  Bremer  ?)  is  a  writer  of  precisely  the 
same  quality  and  grade.  The  Professor's  Favorites  is  a  fair 
match  for  the  President's  Daughters ;  though  perhaps  not 
equal  to  the  Neighbors  or  Home.  Miss  Austen  is  another 
British  authoress  with  whom  Miss  Bremer  has  been  com 
pared.  They  resemble  each  other  certainly  in  the  fact,  that 
they  are  both  writers  of  the  domestic  novel,  as  it  may  be 
called ;  yet  Miss  Austen  is  quite  deficient  in  the  strikingly 
poetical  qualities  which  relieve  even  the  homliest  details  of 
the  Swedish  novels.  She  is  quite  prosaic,  and  if  possible  a 
little  exclusive ;  perhaps  too  much  taken  up  with  titled  per 
sonages.  Though  decorous,  proper,  sensible  and  judicious, 
where  do  you  find  in  her  novels,  the  vivacity,  the  humor  of 
the  Neighbors  or  Home  ?  The  depth  of  feeling  in  these  works, 
as  well  as  in  the  Strife  and  Peace,  can  nowhere  be  paralleled 
in  Prejudice  or  Mansfield  Park. 

To  the  two  prominent  names  in  American  female  author 
ship,  we  should  have  added  that  of  Mrs.  Childs,  a  pure, 
sweet,  amiable  writer,  whose  philanthropy  is  unbounded  and 
carried  out  in  deeds  of  practical  benevolence.  The  produc- 

*  The  Colonel  can  hardly  be  called  one  of  the  characters,  as  he 
plays  no  part,  soon  leaves  the  scene,  and  is  altogether  only  passive. 


198  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

tions  of  this  lady  are  conceived  in  the  most  genial  spirit,  and 
executed  with  equal  beauty  and  facility. 

We  have  said,  women  write  for  women  ;  we  should  fur 
ther  remark  that  there  is  a  race  of  masculine  writers,  with 
feminine  delicacy  of  mind,  who  ought  to  be  added  to  the  list 
of  novelists  for  a  lady's  reading.  Such  are  the  exquisite  sen 
timental  painters,  Richardson,  Marivaux,  Mackenzie,  Jean 
Paul  and  Goldsmith.  These  are  peculiarly  authors  for  wo 
men.  Rousseau,  Sterne  and  Goethe,  equal  masters  of  the 
female  heart,  and  whose  works  contain  the  purest  essence  of 
ethereal  sentiment,  are  dangerous  writers,  inasmuch  as  their 
works  are  fraught  with  deleterious  influences,  which  require  a 
strong  intellect  and  a  vigorous  moral  sense  to  withstand. — 
American  literature  can  point  to  three  names  of  the  first 
rank  of  excellence  in  this  way  of  writing,  Dana,  Hawthorne, 
and  Washington  Irving.  We  reverse  the  usual  order  of 
merit,  as  we  conceive  Mr.  Irving  to  be  much  inferior,  in  this 
respect  (abundantly  made  up  by  his  humor,  power  of  descrip 
tion,  narrative,  and  researches),  to  the  first  and  second  writ 
ers,  who  are  so  much  less  known.  Dana  has  a  vein  of  fresh, 
original,  deep  feeling — at  times  most  powerful  in  its  expres 
sion,  and  always  strong  and  simple — while  Irving's  best  sen 
timent  is  borrowed  from  Mackenzie  and  Goldsmith.  Paul 
Felton,  Edward  and  Mary,  the  Son,  are  much  superior  to 
anything  of  the  same  kind  in  Irving.  Dana  has  a  deeper  as 
well  as  a  more  original  genius :  yet  the  exquisite  comic  pic 
tures  of  Irving  are  quite  out  of  the  reach  of  the  more  serious 
writer.  Hawthorne  is  a  true  poet  and  admirable  writer — 
what  fancy,  what  deep  melancholy,  what  invention,  what 
pure,  cheerful  gladness,  what  pictures,  in  his  delightful  tales  ! 
He  can  excite  almost  terror,  and  almost  mirth  :  hovering 
ever  between  the  two.  And  his  style  !  a  mountain-spring  is 


SINGLE-SPEECH    POETS,  199 

not  more  limpid  and  transparent :  his  genuine  Faith,  his 
manly  Love,  his  true  Religion,  are  not  to  be  forgotten.  Why 
does  not  this  choicest  of  our  writers  give  us  more  twice-told 
tales,  or  a  new  series  of  charming  historical  sketches  for 
children,  which  all  ages  may  read  with  pleasure  ?  Who  but 
he  can  give  us  the  true  history  of  Salem  witchcraft,  half 
legend,  half  sad  reality  ?  What  stores  of  romance  yet  un- 
worked,  lie  hidden  in  the  early  history  of  New  England  \ 


XXVII. 


SINGLE-SPEECH   POETS.' 


A  REMARK  of  Horace  Walpole  (that  most  acute  judge  of  the 
niceties  of  literature)  is  set  down  in  the  Walpoliana,  on  this 
very  topic,  and  which,  indeed,  had  suggested  the  following 
illustrations  of  his  criticism,  lie  speaks  of  writers,  who,  like 
certain  plants,  flower  but  once — whose  poetic  genius  bloomed 
early,  for  a  single  time,  and  never  again  put  forth  a  bud. 
These  writers,  in  poetry,  resemble  single- speech  Ilamilton  in 
oratory  (the  coincidence  furnishes  the  excuse  of  the  caption), 
and  ever  remain  a  source  of  literary  curiosity — a  problem  not 
to  be  readily  solved  on  ordinary  premises.  It  is  one  of  the 
most  curious  of  all  literary  curiosities,  and  yet  we  do  not  re 
member  that  D'Israeli  has  devoted  a  paper  to  the  subject, 
nor  even  made  any  reference  to  it — an  omission  quite  un 
accountable  in  him,  as  it  falls  naturally  within  his  province. 
*  1615. 


200  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

A  beautiful  Anthology  might  be  collected  from  the  writ 
ings  of  poets,  who  have  exhausted  themselves,  as  it  were,  in 
a  single  effort ;  caught  but  a  single  glance  of  the  divinity  ; 
but  once  felt  "  the  god."  In  a  supplement  to  this  exquisite 
bouquet,  richer  than  that  of  Ellis  or  Longfellow,  though  they 
come  very  near  to  the  ideal  we  speak  of,  might  be  included 
the  few  fine  short  poems,  of  those  who  have  written  long 
works  of  mediocre  or  perhaps  even  doubtful  standing.  A  few 
delicate  morfeaux  of  Southey  will  be  preserved  by  an  affec 
tionate  race  of  readers,  whose  benevolence  even  cannot  pre 
vent  the  utter  oblivion  of  his  unwieldy  epical  attempts. 
Even  Gay,  who  wrote  well  always,  has  been  immortalized  by 
his  Ballads  and  Fables,  rather  than  by  his  Trivia. 

Another  class,  still,  beside  the  writers  of  one  or  more 
choice  short  poems,  and  the  writers  of  long  and  dull  insipid 
productions,  is  that  of  the  great  writers  who  have  written 
much,  and  of  whose  works,  even  when  equally  fine,  the  short 
est  are  the  best  known,  merely  because  they  are  brief.  Thus, 
Dryden's  Alexander's  Feast  is  known  to  many,  from  being 
met  with  in  all  the  ordinary  selections  and  elegant  extracts, 
while  his  no  less  admirable  romantic  tales  from  Boccaccio 
and  Chaucer,  his  delightful  Fables,  Epistles  to  Oldham,  and 
Congreve,  and  Kneller  (on  which  Pope  could  only  refine), 
Secular  Masque,  and  his  vigorous  political  satires,  are  com 
paratively  unknown.  Thousands  have  read,  or  sung,  or 
heard  sung,  Young  Lochinvar,  for  the  hundreds  who  have 
read  Marmion.  And  Moore  is  the  poet  of  the  parlor,  for  the 
Melodies  he  has  written,  while  his  Lalla  Rookh  is  read  as  a 
critical  duty,  and  by  way  of  task. 

According  to  the  above  classification,  many  pleasing  versi 
fiers  would  rank  very  high  among  the  minor  Poets,  whose 
standing  is  low  among  the  master  Bards. 


SINGLE-SPEECH    POKTfc*.  201 

As  to  the  philosophy  of  the  matter,  we  confess  it  inex 
plicable.  Why  one  who  has  once  succeeded  should  not  do 
equally  well  again,  many  causes  may  be  assigned  ;  yet  not 
one  of  them  carries  sufficient  weight  to  settle  the  question 
determinately.  The  various  reasons  are  sufficiently  plausible, 
yet  may  be  easily  set  aside  on  further  reflection  Sheer  in 
dolence  !  cries  one ;  timidity,  exclaims  another :  want  of 
leisure,  reasons  a  third;  rather,  want  of  power,  adds  a  fourth  ; 
perhaps,  all  together,  judiciously  concludes  a  fifth. 

Some  persons  seem  to  regard  these  writers — as  some  old 
dogmatist  called  Goldsmith — inspired  idiots,  who  hare,  by 
chance,  hit  upon  a  new  thought  or  view,  which  they  want 
skill  and  training  to  follow  up — as  delicious  harmonies  may 
float  on  the  mind  of  one  who  is  ignorant  of  the  science  of 
sweet  sounds. 

In  truth,  the  fact  is  as  wonderful  as  that  would  be  (of 
which  we  are  ignorant,  if  it  has  ever  happened)  of  a  painter 
who  had  finished  but  one  good  picture  in  the  course  of  his 
life — who  had  caught  for  a  single  time  the  cordial  and 
kindly  aspect  of  nature — who,  once  only,  had  gained  power 
to  interpret  the  soul,  speaking  in  the  face.  Who  ever  heard, 
or  read  of,  or  saw,  the  single  celebrated  production  of  a 
sculptor,  or  musical  composer,  or  architect,  who  had  any 
thing  of  a  desirable  reputation  ?  We  do  not  speak  of  the 
clever  things  done  by  ingei'.ious  amateurs,  but  of  single 
works  (not  plays,  as  Ben  Jonson  used  to  distinguish),  ex 
ecuted  by  professional  artists. 

Yet  as  matters  of  literary  and  personal  history,  that  was 
really  the  case  of  the  authors  of  the  Burial  of  Sir  John  Moore 
and  the  Ode  to  the  Cuckoo.  WTolfe  wrote  two  or  throe  other 
fine  things  in  verse  and  prose,  yet  nothing  comparable  to  this 
master  piece.  Logan  is  known  only  by  the  ode  we  rotor  to. 
9* 


202  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

The  Braes  of  Yarrow  enshrine  the  memory  of  Hamilton  o  f 
Bangour,  and  have  led  greater  bards  to  the  scene,  to  offer 
up  their  tributes,  still  inferior  to  the  first.  Why  is  this  all 
we  have  of  these  delicate  poets  ?  With  such  fancy,  such 
feeling,  a  taste  so  refined,  a  versification  so  graceful,  how 
happens  it  we  hear  no  more  strains  from  these  nightingales 
of  a  night?  Not  wholly  so  besotted  as  to  be  careless  of 
fame  ;  rather,  so  far  from  that,  as,  in  the  case  of  Wolfe,  to 
be  sensitively  alive  to  generous  praise  and  to  noble  action  ; 
and,  as  to  Logan,  we  believe  he,  too,  was  a  clergyman,  a  re 
tired  scholar,  and  man  of  pure  taste.  Both  were  (if  we  re 
collect  aright)  invalids,  constitutionally  feeble,  and  hence 
incapable  of  long  flights  of  fancy  or  close  study.  They  had 
leisure — poetic  impulses  could  not  have  been  wanting,  for 
subjects  and  occasions  never  wholly  fail  the  Muse  ;  the  ad 
miration  of  friends,  we  may  conclude,  was  theirs.  A  single 
obstacle  only  remains,  and  that  furnishes,  probably,  the  oc 
casion  or  reason  of  their  silence — a  fastidious  taste,  like 
Campbell's,  who  was  said  to  be  frightened  by  the  shadow  of 
his  fame,  that  could  not  be  satisfied  with  anything  short  of 
perfection,  which  it  failed  to  realize.  Genuine  modesty,  and 
a  sensitive  temperament,  were  leading  traits  (we  presume,  of 
course)  of  the  writers.  These  held  their  hand,  and  restrain 
ed  the  otherwise  willing  pen.  The  same  reasons  will  not 
seem  to  excuse  the  short  poems  of  Raleigh  and  Wotton,  who 
feared  no  critical  tribunals ;  whose  minds  were  braced  by 
manly  action  ;  who  united  all  characters  and  talents  and  ac 
complishments  ;  who,  with  learning  and  (at  some  period) 
leisure,  and  fancy,  and  power,  have  left  a  very  few  and  very 
brief  copies  of  verse,  worthy  of  being  printed  in  letters  of 
gold.  They  were  not  men,  like  their  later  brother  bards,  to 
entertain  a  feeling  of  despair  at  ever  again  equalling  the  fine 


SINGLE-SPEECH    POETS.  208 

things  they  had  accomplished  early  in  life.  In  them,  there 
fore,  it  is  but  fair  to  suppose,  that  the  poetic  bore  a  slight 
proportion  to  the  political  and  scholastic  and  business-cha 
racters,  which  rendered  them  famous. 

The  minds  of  men  change ;  their  aims  vary  at  different 
epochs.  They  entertain  different  views  of  life,  of  action,  of 
ambition.  Many  youthful  tastes  (the  accompaniment  of  ani 
mal  spirits,  rather  than  the  fruit  of  settled  inclination)  vanish 
as  men  grow  older.  How  many  young  poets  have  settled 
down  into  middle-aged  prose  men ;  how  many  airy  ro 
mancers  become  converted  into  matter-of-fact  critics.  Reli 
gion,  in  some  instances,  teaches  (falsely,  we  conceive)  the  sin 
of  all  but  devotional  strains  :  unquestionably,  when  pure  and 
noble,  the  highest  kind  of  verse,  but  not  the  only  allowable 
form.  In  this  case,  too,  where  piety  is  perverted,  the  praises 
of  men  appear  so  worthless  and  unsatisfactory,  that  the  bard 
relinquishes  the  exercise  of  his  divine  gift  (in  a  wrong  spirit) 
before  men,  that  he  may  offer  up  his  praises,  pure  and  unal 
loyed,  with  angels  and  the  blessed,  to  the  Almighty  Giver 
of  the  glorious  faculty  itself  (among  innumerable  blessings). 

Various  pursuits,  too,  warp  the  imagination  from  poetical 
flights,  and  confine  the  studies  that  arise  from  fancy  and  taste 
to  a  narrow  circle,  if  not  consign  them  over  to  "  dumb  for- 
getfulness  a  prey."  Three  great  lawyers  have  been  made 
out  of  tolerable  poets,  who  might  have  ranked  among  the 
first  of  the  third  rank,  the  Dii  Minores  of  our  idolatry — 
Blackstone,  Sir  William  Jones,  and  Lord  Thurlow  ;  judge- 
ships  and  bishoprics  oblige  the  holders  and  occupants  of 
these  stations  to  hide,  sometimes,  a  rare  and  peculiar  talent. 
Yet  some  bishops  have  been  wits,  as  Earle  and  Corbet : 
though  too  frequently  the  office  stultifies  the  head,  while  it 
hardens  the  heart. 


204  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

Without  any  further  attempt  at  unravelling  the  causey  of 
this  literary  phenomenon,  we  will  at  once  bring  together  the 
following  notices  of  writers  of  the  kind  we  have  undertaken 
to  describe,  without  pretending  (from  the  nature  of  the  case 
an  almost  impossible  thing)  to  produce  all  who  deserve  men 
tion.  On  the  contrary,  we  can  promise  to  quote  only  a  few, 
as  we  write  from  memory,  and  without  the  means  of  extend 
ing  our  list. 

To  commence  with  two  court  poets  of  the  age  of  Charles 
II.,  when  "  the  mob  of  gentlemen  who  write  with  ease,"  first 
appeared.  Denham,  the  fashionable  poet  of  his  day,  now 
ranks  as  such  in  the  select  collections,  mainly  on  the  strength 
of  the  Cooper's  Hill.  Dorset,  one  of  the  most  delightful  and 
accomplished  characters  of  that  court  of  wits  and  gallants,  is 
best  known  in  political  history  by  his  ballad,  said  to  have 
been  written  at  sea  during  the  first  Dutch  war,  1665,  the 
night  before  the  engagement.  He  has  penned  a  couple  of 
delightful  songs  or  so,  but  his  poetical  claims  rest  chiefly  on 
the  ballad.  Pomfrefs  "  Choice"  stands  quite  alone  ;  the 
single  popular  poem  of  its  author,  an  agreeable,  pleasant 
piece  of  versification,  presenting  the  ideal  of  a  quiet,  comfort 
able,  retired  literary  life.  Swift's  version  of  Horace's  lines  is 
more  Horatian,  but  less  English.  Cowley  and  Norris,  who 
both  translated  the  philosophic  picture  of  Seneca,  of  a  similar 
strain,  are  more  philosophic  and  high  toned,  but  do  not  ap 
proach  so  closely  the  more  equal  current  of  daily  life.  Leigh 
Hunt  has  praised  Pomfret,  and  somewhere,  we  think,  directly 
imitated  "  Choice,"  adding  to  the  verse  a  grace  of  his  own. 
Dr.  Johnson  passed  upon  him  no  more  than  a  just  eulogium. 
To  the  masculine  moralist  and  the  agreeable  essayist  we  bow, 
in  deference  to  their  united  judgment.  John  Phillips  is 
famous  for  his  celebrated  burlesque  of  Milton  (the  "Splendid 


SINGLE-SPEECH    POETS.  205 

Shilling"),  but  we  can  recollect  no  other  poem  of  his  of  any 
thing  like  equal  merit.  Pamelas  Hermit  is  his  chef- 
d'oeuvre.  Many  who  know  him  as  a  poet,  know  nothing  of 
his  verses  to  his  wife,  and  one  or  two  other  short  pieces,  al 
most  equally  tine.  Blair's  "  Grave"  (the  resting  place  of 
Mortality)  has  made  him  immortal.  Green's  "  Spleen,"  and 
Dyer's  "  Grongar  Hill,"  poems  excellent  in  their  different 
styles  of  manly  satire  and  picturesque  description,  are,  we  be 
lieve,  the  only  works  of  these  authors  that  have  escaped  ob 
livion.  As  writers  of  single  poems,  we  may,  by  a  forced 
construction,  "  compel  to  come  in"  certain  of  the  old  drama 
tists,  and  though  they  do  not  properly  rank  under  this  head, 
we  may  be  glad  to  eke  out  our  list  by  such  delights  of  the 
muses  as  the  noble  Dirge  in  Webster's  terrible  tragedy,  Shir 
ley's  tine  stanzas ;  and  scattered  songs,  "  fancies,"  and  "  good- 
nights,"  that  occur  in  the  rare  old  comedies  and  tragedies  : 
from  Gammer  Gurton's  Needle,  that  can  boast  the  first  and 
one  of  the  best  drinking  songs  in  the  language,  down  to,  and 
half  through,  the  age  of  Elizabeth,  the  age  of  Marlow  and 
his  contemporaries,  just  previous  to  the  golden  era  of  the 
Shaksperean  drama.  Many  of  the  minor  poets,  whether  gay 
or  religious,  of  the  seventeenth  century,  have  left  sparkling 
gems,  such  as  the  delicate  flowers  that  blossom  in  the  poetic 
gardens  of  Carew,  Herrick,  King,  Vnughan,  Lovelace,  <fec- 
We  had  written  thus  far,  when  we  met  with  Longfellow's 
Waif,  &  delicate  and  tasteful  anthology,  which,  however, 
should  have  included  a  galaxy  of  rare  old  poems  :  the  later 
writers  are  sufficiently  well  known. 

Certain  of  the  noble  old  prose  writers,  to  be  ranked,  by  the 
production  of  one  fine  poem — if  by  no  other  claim — by  title 
of  courtesy,  among  poets,  ought  not  to  be  omitted,  as  Bunyan, 
in  the  pithy,  sententious  lines  prefixed  to  his  "  Pilgrim  ;" 


206  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

Burton's  fine  versified  abstract  of  his  own  "  Anatomy  ;  and 
Walton's  "Angler's  Wish."  These  are  "rarely  delicate,"  as 
Walton  says  of  Marlow  and  Raleigh's  delicious  verses,  "  bet 
ter  than  the  strong  lines  now  in  vogue  in  this  critical  age." 

In  one  department  of  verse,  that  of  Hymns  and  the  versi 
fied  Psalms  of  David,  some  writers  are  classic  from  having 
produced  one  or  two  admirable  pieces  of  the  kind  ;  in  this 
class  come  Addison,  Pope,  Young,  Ken,  Cowper,  Heber, 
Wotton. 

Many  writers,  of  very  considerable  pretensions,  have  suc 
ceeded  in  one  long  poem,  but  are  not  generally  known  by 
any  second  production  of  equal  value.  Of  this  class  the  best 
instances  are  Young,  in  his  "  Night  Thoughts" — hard  reading, 
except  in  detached  passages ;  Akemide's  "  Pleasures  of  Im 
agination"  (with  all  his  pomp  of  philosophic  speculation  and 
elaborate  fancy,  very  heavy  for  these  very  reasons.)  The 
Pleasures,  (by  the  way)  of  Memory  and  Hope,  in  these  long 
general  poems,  are  far  from  pleasant  reading;  Churchill, 
whose  local  and  temporary  satires  are  forgotten  and  give 
place  to  his  "  Rosciad,"  a  monument  of  his  sense,  acuteness, 
and  happy  satire — a  gallery  of  theatrical  portraits  hit  off  with 
the  justness  and  vivacity  of  Pope,  and  forming  a  capital  sup 
plement  to  Colley  Gibber's  collection  ;  Allan  Ramsay's 
"Gentle  Shepherd,"  that  Arcadian  pastoral;  Garth,  in  his 
"  Dispensary,"  an  author  in  whom  the  man  and  humorist 
was  more  than  a  match  for  the  poet ;  Somerville's  "  Chase," 
pretty  fair  verse  for  a  sporting  country  gentleman ;  and 
Armstrong's  "  Art  of  Preserving  Health,"  a  sensible  essay 
that  might  as  well  have  been  written  in  prose.  The  same 
criticism  may  be  applied  to  Garth  and  Somerville. 

Among  general  readers  the  Hudibras  of  Butler  is  eagerly 
perused  by  all  who  delight  in  the  union  of  sense,  wit,  and 


BINGLE-SPEECH    POETS.  207 

learning,  all  devoted  to  the  cause  and  end  of  wholesome  sa 
tire  ;  yet  the  other  sharp  satires  of  the  same  writer  are, 
virtually,  unknown.  And  the  Seasons  of  Thompson,  by  no 
means  his  best  poem,  is  universally  read,  while  very  few  ever 
think  of  glancing  at  the  delightful  "  Castle  of  Indolence,"  of 
which  he  was  both  the  creator  and  master. 

Then  again,  certain  fine  poems  are  continually  quoted,  not 
as  the  sole  efforts,  but  as  the  masterpieces  of  their  authors, 
quite  to  the  exclusion  of  any  other  works  of  theirs  ;  the  se 
lection,  for  instance,  of  such  fine  poems  as  the  Ode  to  the 
Passions  and  the  Elegy  in  a  Country  Churchyard,  in  works 
on  .elocution,  with  which  every  schoolboy  is  familiar,  has 
thrown  the  other  equally  fine  pieces  by  the  same  authors, 
comparatively  into  the  shade.  Shenstone's  Schoolmistress 
comes  within  the  same  category  ;  but  after  all,  the  fame  of 
the  poet  depends  on  it  alone.  The  ballad  of  Jemmy  Dawson 
is  not  superior  to  many  that  have  been  consigned  to  obscurity  ; 
while  the  Pastoral  Ballad,  with  a  certain  vein  of  tenderness, 
does  not  rank  much  above  Hammond's  strain  (once  called 
the  English  Ovid),  which  has  been  long  since,  and  not  un 
justly,  forgotten. 

A  delicate  volume  might  be  made  up  of  single  poems  of 
English  and  American  poets  of  this  century.  In  English 
poetical  literature,  Mrs.  Southey's  Paupers's  Death-Bed, 
Noels's  Pauper's  Funeral,  delicate  verses  of  Darley,  Mont 
gomery's  Grave,  <fec.,  &c. 

Our  American  Parnassus  entertains  many  occupants,  who 
can  prefer  but  a  single  claim  (or  two)  for  possession.  The 
following  are  some  of  the  gems  we  can,  at  present,  recall. 
The  famous  song  of  R.  T.  Paine,  entitled  Adams  and  Liberty, 
though  its  poetical  value  was  slight,  was  the  best  paid  copy 
of  verses  ever  printed  here,  and  exceedingly  popular :  the 


208  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

spirited  "  Indian  Burial  Ground,"  of  Freneau,  which  Long 
fellow  has  lately  recovered,  and  whence  Campbell   borrowed 
a  line  or  two.     Coke's  Florence   Vane,  Neals's  Birth  of  a 
Poet,  Wilde's  My  Life  is  like   a  Summer's  Rose,  Pierpont's 
affecting  lines  on  his  dead  child,  Lindley  Murray's  charming 
verses  to  his  wife,  Pinckney's  spirited  and  truly  poetical  songs, 
Aldrich's  Death  Bed,  Field's  Dirge  on  a  Young  Girl,  Wood- 
worth's  Old  Oaken    Bucket,    Eastman's   Farmer's   Day,  &c. 
But  our  best  fugitive  poetry  has  been  written  by  prose  writers. 
Irving's   delicious   lines,   the    Dull   Lecture,    illustrating,  or 
illustrated  by  (we  know   not  which),    a   capital    picture   of 
Stuart  Newton ;  and  his  classic  verses  to  the  Passaic  River,  as 
graceful  and  picturesque  as  that  winding  stream.    C.  C.  Moore 
has  in  a  choice  volume,  among  other  delicate  verses,  included 
three  classic  poems  sufficient  to  secure  a  place  for  their  author 
on  the  same  shelf  with   Gray,  Campbell,  and  Logan  :  the 
capital  humorous  visit  of  St.  Nicholas — with  the  verses  to 
the  Poet's  wife,  and  the  lines  to  his  children,   accompanying 
their  father's  portrait :  verses  worthy  of  Goldsmith.     A  noble 
poem  on  Alaric,  by   Governor  Everett;  some  fine   versions 
from  the  German,  by  the  Hon.  Alexander  Everett ;  three  or 
four  admirable  pieces  by  John  Waters  ;  the  two  last  addressed 
to  ladies,  printed  in  the   American   newspaper,  some  six  or 
seven  years  ago.    Nicholas  Biddle  wrote  some  very  agreeable 
jeux  d'esprit  and  vers  de  societe.    A  lively  epistle  of  this  kind 
appeared  in  the  weekly  New  Mirror  last  summer.     A  noble 
poem,  "The  Days  of  my  Youth  and  of  my  Age  Contrasted," 
by  the  Hon.  St.  Geo.  Tucker,   of   Virginia,  has  been  going 
the  rounds  of  the  papers  for  a   year  past.     Can    no   printed 
book  or  magazine  show  us  more  of  the  author  ?     We  often 
ask  ourselves  this  question,  with  regard  to    many   other  au 
thors,  without  ever  receiving  a   satisfactory  answer.     Very 


PREFACES    AND    DEDICATIONS.  209 

many  such  we  still  remain  in  utter  ignorance  of,  in  common 
with  the  reading  public,  and  this  fact  must  account  for  our 
omissions.  When  we  think  of  the  stupid  long  poems,  with 
which  the  world  has  been  deluged  for  years  past,  and  recol 
lect  how  many  exquisite  brief  pieces  are  lost  merely  by  their 
brevity,  as  a  jewel  is  hidden  in  a  pile  of  common  stones,  we 
often  wish  that  a  critical  police  might  be  continually  kept  up, 
to  pound  all  stray  poetical  cattle ;  or,  at  least,  to  advertise 
where  they  might  be  found. 


XXVIII. 

ON    PREFACES    AND    DEDICATIONS. 

THE  day  of  prefaces  and  courtly  dedications  is  well  nigh  past. 
The  readers  of  the  present  generation  are  generally  in  too 
great  a  hurry  to  penetrate  the  inner  courts  of  the  Temple  of 
Truth,  or  oftener  of  Pleasure,  to  linger  long  about  the  sacred 
Porch,  and  are  too  apt  to  neglect  the  formal  compliments 
and  elaborate  address  of  the  janitor,  at  the  gate.  With  a 
disregard  and  indifference  (more  especially  with  us  Ameri 
cans)  to  the  amenities  of  social  intercourse,  has  also  been 
introduced  a  carelessness  on  the  part  of  authors.  Rarely  we 
meet  a  conciliatory  poem  or  an  affectionate  salutatory  ;  still 
less  frequently  we  encounter  a  critical  introduction,  or  argu 
ment  of  the  work.  Modern  society  laughs  at  the  studied 
courtesies  of  the  old  school  of  politeness  ;  and  modern  critics 
are  equally  inclined  to  ridicule  the  hyperbolical  praises  and 
scholastic  introductions  of  their  literary  forefathers.  But  let 
us  discriminate.  At  the  same  time  that  the  herd  of  authors 


210  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

(not  very  different  in  the  most  unpleasant  aspects,  at  any 
one  period  from  what  they  are  at  all  others)  ran  riot  in 
extravagant  adulations,  and  prolix,  stupid  and  tiresome  self- 
eulogium,  or  worse  yet,  self-censure,  there  were  writers  living 
who  have  made  the  Preface  and  the  Dedication  classical  pro 
vinces  of  elegant  composition  ;  whose  skill  in  spirited  por 
trait  and  delicate  flattery,  in  the  last  department,  and  whose 
clear,  acute,  and  copious  analogies  and  illustration,  in  the 
first,  have  rendered  them  indispensable  appendages  to  the 
works  we  are  accustomed  to  regard  as  standards  in  their 
class. 

A  preface  may  be  regarded  as  having  the  same  relation 
to  the  work  that  follows  as  a  prologue  to  a  play ;  or  when 
extended  and  explanatory,  as  an  overture  to  an  opera.  It 
should  give  the  reader  the  key-note  to  the  book  itself,  and 
the  harmonies  it  is  supposed  to  contain.  Or  else  it  should, 
in  a  bird's-eye  view,  display  the  whole  scope  of  the  theme, 
with  all  its  bearings.  It  should  rarely  admit  of  an  apolo 
getic  tone,  and  never  deprecate  the  honest  severity  of  just 
criticism.  That  is  a  bad  book  as  well  as  a  feeble  character, 
that  begs  off  from  a  close  inspection.  There  should  be  no 
petitio  principiij  no  morbid  modesty ;  neither  any  false  fears, 
nor  artful  affectations.  Its  business  is  to  speak  the  truth,  yet 
not  necessarily  the  whole  of  the  truth.  It  is  well  to  keep 
something  in  reserve;  to  promise  too  little  rather  than  too 
much ;  to  know  how  to  disappoint  one's  friends  the  right 
way. 

In  the  Dedication,  the  writer  makes  his  bow  and  presents 
his  compliments;  addressing  a  near  friend,  or  heart's  idol  (a 
great  author  or  public  character,  who  stands  on  an  elevation 
far  above  him,  yet  whom  he  cherishes  with  an  affectionate 
veneration) ;  and,  although  the  custom  is  rapidly  falling  into 


PREFACES    AND    DEDICATIONS.  211 

disuse,  it  seems  to  us  as  disrespectful  to  the  reader  for  a 
writer  to  omit  this  piece  of  introductory  civility,  as  it  would 
appear  to  any  well-bred  company  for  a  person  to  enter  with 
out  saluting  any  member  of  it,  and  depart  in  the  same  grace 
less  manner.  A  similar  omission  in  letters,  of  an  epithet  of 
attachment  or  regard,  strikes  us  much  in  the  same  way  as  if 
one  stopped  another  in  the  street,  and  fell  at  once  into  con 
versation  with  him  without  shaking  of  hands,  a  smile,  an 
inquiry  after  the  person's  health  who  is  addressed,  a  passing 
good-morrow,  or  even  a  civil  nod.  When  a  man  wishes 
to  assume  a  magisterial  air,  to  write  in  the  imperative  or 
minatory  mood,  he  may  waive  all  forms  of  address.  But 
between  friends  it  is  one  of  the  indispensable  bonds  of  con 
nection,  and  furnishes  one  of  the  strongest  ties  (however 
slight  it  may  appear)  to  lasting  attachment. 

Not  to  trench  further  upon  the  confined  limits  to  which 
our  lucubrations  are  restricted,  we  must  make  an  end  of  these 
prefatory  remarks  and  come  to  the  point. 

In  looking  through  the  Index  to  the  first  series  of  the 
Curiosities  of  Literature,  we  remarked  a  section  on  Prefaces  ; 
and  began  to  think  we  had  chanced  upon  a  topic  already 
exhausted  by  the  learned  research  and  ingenious  criticism  of 
the  elder  D'lsraeli.  But  a  reference  to  the  paragraph  in 
question  speedily  satisfied  us  how  much  more  had  been  left 
for  subsequent  essayists ;  that  the  liberal  antiquary  had  by 
no  means  employed  a  tithe  of  his  resources,  had  merely  in 
dicated  a  point  or  two,  leaving  the  multifarious  instances  for 
future  inquirers  to  accumulate  and  dispose.  Of  what  he  has 
written,  however  (a  page  or  two  only),  we  readily  avail  our 
selves,  for  who  has  more  justly  gained  the  title  of  the  Literary 
Antiquary  than  D'lsraeli,  and  from  whose  books  can  our 
later  critics  gain  a  better  insight  into  many  curiosities  of 


212  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

literature,  .and  the  profession  of  authorship,  than  from  the 
fragmentary  note-books  of  the  same  author  ? 

Prefaces,  it  appears,  are  no  modern  inventions.  Cicero  is 
said  to  have  kept  a  volume  by  him  fitted  for  all  sorts  of 
works ;  a  species  of  assorted  common-places  cast  into  the 
form  of  an  address.  Prefaces  then,  as  more  lately,  even 
down  to  the  time  of  Johnson,  were  written  to  order,  by 
authors,  who  wrote  only  that  part  of  the  published  book. 
Some  introductions,  too,  were  and  have  been  written  which 
might  have  answered  equally  well  for  any  productions  of  a 
similar  cast.  This  is  well-known  of  Sail  list's  introductory 
paragraphs  to  his  two  histories.  And,  if  we  are  not  mis 
taken  in  the  recollection,  Clarendon's  preface  to  his  history 
of  the  Rebellion  might  with  slight  alteration  have  answered 
for  a  narrative  of  any  popular  revolution.  Sir  W.  Raleigh's 
preface  might  be  prefixed  to  any  universal  history ;  and 
Hooker's  to  any  treatise  on  ecclesiastical  polity,  so  far  as 
the  bearing  of  the  introduction,  on  the  work  that  follows,  is 
concerned.  All  of  these  are,  in  themselves,  intrinsically  noble, 
but  with  little  individuality  or  close  connection  with  the  par 
ticular  subject. 

A  friend  reminds  us  that  the  same  criticism  may  be  ap 
plied  to  Voltaire's  Preface  to  his  History  of  Charles  XII. ;  we 
had  forgotten  this  instance,  but  adopt  it  on  the  testimony  of 
a  witness  so  likely  to  be  correct.  Many  other  examples,  e 
dare  say,  might  be  produced ;  but  a  few  are  sufficient. 

If  we  were  to  fix  an  era  when  prefaces  might  be  said  to  be 
emphatically  in  fashion  in  England,  we  should  be  obliged  to 
include  a  couple  of  centuries  at  least;  from  the  beginning  of 
the  reign  of  James  I.  to  the  end  of  the  reign  of  George  III. 
We  might  commence  nearly  a  century  earlier,  but  restrict 
ourselves  within  pretty  well  defined  limits.  A  book  pub- 


PREFACES    AND    DEDICATIONS.  213 

lished  at  that  period,  whatever  its  character  or  pretensions, 
without  a  preface  of  some  description,  or  a  dedication  of  some 
kind,  might  have  been  regarded  as  an  anomaly.  With  this 
necessary  requisition,  it  was  not  expected,  however,  that  all 
prefaces  and  all  dedications  should  be  cast  in  the  same 
mould.  It  was  enough,  if  the  usual  form  and  style  of  the 
one,  and  the  customary  spirit  and  length  of  the  others, 
were  observed.  It  is  curious,  therefore,  to  remark  the 
variety  of  styles,  and  the  difference  of  manner.  Flattery 
wore  a  number  of  elegant  disguises,  from  the  magnificent 
hyperbole  of  Bacon  to  the  easy  grace  of  Steele.  Criticism 
was  one  thing  in  the  hands  of  the  harmonious  Dryden,  and 
quite  another  thing  in  the  pages  of  the  brilliant  and  senten 
tious  Pope. 

Perhaps  the  finest  preface  in  the  language  is  Pope's  Pre 
face  to  his  Miscellanies,  most  of  them  written  before  the  age 
of  twenty-five.  And,  for  our  own  parts,  we  regard  the  dedi 
cation  of  the  Lover,  by  Steele,  as  the  noblest  dedication  we 
ever  read.  As  the  volume  is  very  scarce,  we  quote  the  entire 
epistle,  as  a  masterpiece  of  its  kind : 

"  To  Sir  Samuel  Garth,  M.  D. 

"  SIR  :  As  soon  as  I  thought  of  making  the  Lover  a 
present  to  one  of  my  friends,  I  resolved,  without  further  dis 
tracting  iny  choice,  to  send  it  To  the  Best-natured  Man. 
You  are  so  universally  known  for  this  character,  that  an 
epistle  so  directed  would  find  its  way  to  you  without  your 
name,  and  I  believe  nobody  but  you  yourself  would  deliver 
such  a  superscription  to  any  other  person. 

"  This  propensity  is  the  nearest  akin  to  love  ;  and  good 
nature  is  the  worthiest  affection  of  the  mind,  as  love  is  the 
noblest  passion  of  it;  while  the  latter  is  wholly  employed  in 


214  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

endeavoring  to  make  happy  one  single  object,  the  other  dif 
fuses  its  benevolence  to  all  the  world. 

"  As  this  is  your  natural  bent,  I  cannot  but  congratulate 
you  on  the  singular  felicity,  that  your  profession  is  so  agree 
able  to  your  temper.  For  what  condition  is  more  desirable 
than  a  constant  impulse  to  relieve  the  distressed,  and  a  capa 
city  to  administer  that  relief?  When  the  sick  man  hangs  his 
eye  on  that  of  his  physician,  how  pleasing  must  it  be  to  speak 
comfort  to  his  anguish,  to  raise  in  him  the  first  motions  of 
hope,  to  lead  him  into  a  persuasion  that  he  shall  return  to  the 
company  of  his  friends,  the  care  of  his  family,  and  all  the 
blessings  of  being. 

"  The  manner  in  which  you  practice  this  heavenly  faculty 
of  aiding  human  life,  is  according  to  the  liberality  of  science, 
and  demonstrates  that  your  heart  is  more  set  upon  doing 
good  than  growing  rich. 

"The' painful  artifices  which  empirics  are  guilty  of,  to  draw 
cash  out  of  valetudinarians,  are  the  abhorrence  of  your  gene 
rous  mind,  and  it  is  as  common  with  Garth  to  supply  indi 
gent  patients  with  money  for  food,  as  to  receive  it  from 
wealthy  ones  for  physic.  How  much  more  amiable,  Sir, 
would  the  generosity  which  is  already  applauded  by  all  who 
know  you,  appear  to  those  whose  gratitude  you  every  day  re 
fuse,  if  they  knew  that  you  resist  their  presents  lest  you 
should  supply  those  whose  wants  you  know,  by  taking  from 
those  with  whose  necessities  you  are  unacquainted  ? 

"  The  families  you  frequent  receive  you  as  their  friend  and 
well-wisher,  whose  concern,  in  their  behalf,  is  as  great  as  that 
of  those  who  are  related  to  them  by  the  ties  of  blood,  and  the 
sanctions  of  affinity.  This  tenderness  interrupts  the  satisfac 
tions  of  conversations,  to  which  you  are  so  happily  turned,  but 
we  forgive  you  that  our  mirth  is  often  insipid  to  you,  while 


PREFACES    AND    DEDICATIONS.  215 

you  sit  absent  to  what  passes  amongst  us,  from  your  care  of 
such  as  languish  in  sickness.  We  are  sensible  their  dis 
tresses,  instead  of  being  removed  by  company,  return  more 
strongly  to  your  imagination  by  comparison  of  their  condition 
to  the  jollities  of  health. 

"  But  I  forget  I  am  writing  a  dedication  ;  and,  in  an  ad 
dress  of  this  kind,  it  is  more  usual  to  celebrate  men's  great 
talents,  than  those  virtues  to  which  such  talents  should  be 
subservient :  jet,  where  the  bent  of  a  man's  spirit  is  taken  up 
in  the  application  of  his  whole  force  to  serve  the  world  in  his 
profession,  it  would  be  frivolous  not  to  entertain  him  rather 
with  thanks  for  what  he  is,  than  applause  for  what  he  is  ca 
pable  of  being.  Besides,  Sir,  there  is  no  room  for  saying 
anything  to  you,  as  you  are  a  man  of  wit,  and  a  great  poet ; 
all  that  can  be  spoken  in  the  celebration  of  such  faculties  has 
been  incomparably  said  by  yourself  to  others,  or  by  others  to 
you.  You  have  never  been  excelled  in  this  kind  but  by  those 
who  have  written  in  praise  of  you  :  I  will  not  pretend  to  be 
your  rival,  even  with  such  an  advantage  over  you,  but  assur 
ing  you,  in  Mr.  Codrington's*  words,  that  I  do  not  know 
whether  my  admiration  or  love  is  greater. 

"  I  remain,  Sir,  your  most  faithful  friend,  and  most  obliged 

humble  servant, 

"  RICHARD  STEELE." 

If  this  be  not  writing  from  and  to  the  heart,  we  know  not 
what  is.  This  was  one  of  those  rare  occasions  where  both 
writer  and  patron  have  a  generous  spirit,  and  where  praise 
can  be  given  without  servility,  and  received  without  loss  of 
self  respect. 

*  Thou  hast  no  faults,  or  I  no  faults  can  spy  ; 
Tbou  art  all  beauty,  or  nil  Llimlness  I. 

Codrington  to  Dr.  Garth,  before  (he  Dispensary. 


216  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

To  return  to  the  earliest  writers  of  dedications  in  English 
(we  have  forsaken  regularity  of  method  in  the  present  paper, 
but  shall  endeavor  to  regain  it) ;  Bacon's  dedication  of  the 
Advancement,  to  the  King,  is  a  piece  of  keen  satire  and  mag 
nificent  eulogium  united,  forming  a  composition  of  wonderful 
ingenuity  and  eloquence.  Dryden's  dedications  are  equally 
splendid  and  fulsome.  We  cannot  help  admiring  his  rich 
musical  style,  and  copious  matter  (a  Field  of  Cloth  of  Gold), 
but  at  the  same  time  we  lose  all  confidence  in  the  sincerity  of 
a  man  who  could  address  the  most  insipid  peer  of  the  realm 
in  the  same  glowing  colours  with  which  he  would  depict  the 
features  of  the  prince  of  poets.  His  critical  "prefaces  are  even 
finer  yet,  and  may  be  justly  styled  sesthetical  treatises.  Mere 
prefaces  in  a  confined  sense  Dryden  did  not  write,  but  rather 
rich,  copious,  critical  essays.  On  his  own  premises,  and  with 
his  artificial  education,  Dryden  reasoned  vigorously,  and  illus 
trated  his  views  with  beauty,  and  even  splendor  of  ornament. 
He  has  left  on  record  the  finest  portraits  of  the  Elizabethan 
dramatists,  Shakspeare,  Jonson,  Beaumont,  and  Fletcher. 
But  Dryden  is  not  without  defects.  He  is  tediously  mi 
nute  in  criticising  his  own  dramatic  pieces,  and  displays  too 
much  of  erudition  on  points  of  comparatively  trifling  impor 
tance. 

Steele's  dedication  to  the  Lover  we  have  extracted.  The 
dedications  of  the  volumes  of  the  Tattler  are  hardly  less  fine. 
They  are  much  shorter,  and  less  personal,  but  graceful  and 
natural.  In  the  dedication  of  the  first  volume,  to  Mr.  Mayn- 
waring,  he  thus  admirably  sets  forth  (what  should  have  been 
placed  in  a  preface,  for  it  relates  to  the  work  itself,  and  not  to 
its  patron)  the  sum  of  his  endeavors,  and  which  might  be  as 
sumed  with  the  greatest  propriety  by  every  work  of  the  kind  : 
"  The  general  purpose  of  this  paper  is  to  expose  the  false  arts 


PREFACES    AND    DEDICATIONS.  217 

of  life,  to  pull  off  the  disguises  of  cunning,  vanity  and  affec 
tation,  and  to  recommend  a  general  simplicity  in  our  dress, 
our  discourse  and  our  behavior."  In  the  dedication  to  the  se 
cond  volume,  to  Mr.  Edward  Wortley  Montague,  he  thus  de 
licately  compliments  his  benevolent  generosity : — "  I  know 
not  how  to  say  a  more  affectionate  thing  to  you,  than  to  wish 
that  you  may  be  always  what  you  are ;  and  that  you  may 
ever  think,  as  I  know  you  now  do,  that  you  have  a  much 
larger  fortune  than  you  want"  The  third  volume  opens 
with  a  perfect  specimen  of  amenity  and  courteous  eloquence. 
It  is  addressed  to  Lord  Cowper,  in  Steele's  proper  person,  and 
includes  a  brilliant  portrait  of  the  great  statesman  and  forensic 
orator.  The  concluding  volume  of  the  series  is  presented  to 
Lord  Halifax,  the  Mecsenas  of  the  day,  to  whom  every  author 
of  eminence  offered  the  first  fruits  of  his  genius,  and  dedicated 
the  choisest  productions  of  his  maturer  taste.  He  was  the 
nobleman,  ambitious  of  literary  fame,  who  was  "  Fed  with 
soft  dedications  all  day  long,"  by  Addison,  Steele,  Pope, 
Swift  (who  afterwards  changed  his  tune  upon  being  neglected 
by  him),  &c. 

Addison's  dedications  have  not  BO  genial  a  tone  as  his 
fellow-laborer's;  yet  they  are  unquestionably  impressed  with 
the  habitual  elegance  of  his  style.  He  was  fortunate  in  his 
patrons,  the  first  four  volumes  of  the  Spectator  being  address 
ed  to  Somers,  Halifax,  Boyle,  and  Marlborough. 

Pope's  preface,  we  remarked,  was,  perhaps,  the  finest  in  the 
language.  It  is  curt,  polished,  full  of  sense,  with  a  dash  of 
caustic  irony  and  refined  sentiment,  curiously  blended,  and 
written  as  with  a  pen  of  steel.  The  same  antithetical  manner, 
precision  of  thought,  and  brilliancy  of  expression,  that  mark 
the  epigrammatic  verse  of  the  Wasp  of  Twit'nam  prevail  in 
10 


218  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

his  prose ;  and  in  none  of  his  prose  do  they  appear  in  such  a 
vivid  light  as  in  the  preface  to  his  Miscellaneous  Works. 

We  can  only  refrain  from  transcribing  passage  after  pass 
age  by  the  apprehension  of  exceeding  our  prescribed  space, 
and  by  the  reflection  that,  as  the  works  of  Pope  are  so  uni 
versally  accessible,  quotation  would  only  tend  to  encourage 
indolence  in  the  reader,  who  can  turn  to  it  readily. 

Mr.  Chalmers  speaks  of  Johnson's  dedications  as  "  models 
of  courtly  address  ;  they  might  have  been  such  in  the  reign 
of  the  dull  Dutchman,  George  II.,  but  now-a-days  they  read 
a  little  too  much  like  the  pompous  flourishes  of  the  ancient 
regime.  Goldsmith's  dedications  are  much  briefer,  but  more 
to  the  point,  and  more  graceful.  In  an  introduction,  despite 
of  the  triptology  of  his  style,  Johnson  was  at  home.  And 
his  style  was  admirably  suitable  to  occasions  of  moment  and 
themes  of  weight  and  importance.  From  the  sonorous  music 
of  his  best  writing,  we  can  readily  admit  that  Temple  (as  has 
been  asserted)  was  one  of  the  models  of  Johnson's  prose.  In 
point  and  vigor,  Johnson  was  his  superior,  but  he  wants 
Temple's  simplicity  and  ease.  Johnson  used  to  say,  there 
were  two  things  he  knew  he  could  do  well — state  what  a 
work  ought  to  contain,  and  then  relate  the  reasons  or  de 
duce  the  causes  why  the  writer  had  failed  in  executing  what 
he  proposed.  The  first  of  these  talents  he  possessed  to  per 
fection,  as  we  see  by  his  prefaces,  most  of  which  were  written 
to  order,  and  are  often  vastly  superior  to  the  book  they  in 
troduced  to  the  reader.  The  preface  to  Rolt's  Dictionary  of 
Trade  and  Commerce  is  a  striking  instance.  Johnson  had 
never  seen  the  book,  but  was  asked  to  give  a  preface,  which 
he  wrote  accordingly.  He  said  he  knew  what  such  a  book 
ought  to  contain,  and  marked  out  its  expected  contents. 
According  to  Chalmers,  the  production  was  almost  worthless. 


PREFAC19    AND    DEDICATIONS.  219 

When  a  bookseller's  drudge,  the  noble  old  moralist  indited 
many  an  introduction  to  books  of  travel  and  science,  school 
treatises,  translations,  catalogues.  Only  a  few  of  these  have 
been  preserved  in  the  correct  editions  of  his  works. 

Johnson  possessed  great  faculties  of  method  and  classifica 
tion.  He  had  clear  and  strong,  though  not  fine  and  subtle 
powers  of  analysis  and  classification.  Hence  resulted  this 
talent  of  telling  what  a  book  should  contain.  In  a  preface,  it 
was  not  his  business  to  go  farther.  But  in  his  lives  and  ex 
tended  criticisms  he  was  equally  happy  in  assigning  the 
causes  of  ill  success  and  of  certain  failure,  on  particular 
grounds.  Goldsmith's  prefaces  were  less  vigorous,  less  pointed, 
but  more  graceful  and  simply  beautiful. 

After  the  dissolution  of  the  Johnsonian  school  of  writers, 
we  read  few  classical  prefaces  save  by  pupils  of  the  old 
classical  school.  Irving  is  the  last  of  these.  Scott  expended 
considerable  pains  on  his  introductions,  and  proposed  re 
writing  all  of  his  prefaces  to  the  Waverley  novels,  just  before 
his  death.  Much  of  Sir  Walter's  pleasantest  writing  occurs 
in  these  rambling  preludes  to  his  animating  narratives.  Bul- 
wer's  prefaces  are  distorted  by  the  narrowest  egotism  and  un 
bounded  assumption ;  yet  they  are  such  as  a  man  of  his 
talents  would  alone  write.  The  poets  have  written  the  best 
prose  and  the  best  prefaces,  too ;  such  are  (wide  apart  to  be 
sure)  Hunt's  lively  gossipping  introductions,  and  Words 
worth's  elevated  lectures,  for  such  they  amount  to,  on  the 
dignity  and  nobleness  of  his  art. 

We  trust  the  day  is  coming  when  writers  will  return  to 
the  composition  of  prefaces,  if  only  to  preserve  an  historical 
interest  in  their  works.  Much  of  the  interest  of  the  old  pre 
faces  is  derived  from  the  names  at  the  top  and  bottom  of  the 
page,  with  the  date  of  publication.  Prefaces  thus  afford 


220  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

authentic  materials  for  literary  history,  and  if  carefully  exe 
cuted,  for  literary  criticism.     They  preserve,  too,  a  regard  for 
the  good  and  well-tested  standard  forms  of  writing,  and  in 
themselves  require  a  species  of  talent  that  should  not  be 
neglected.     To  declare  his  principal  aims,  and  explain  his 
chief  intentions,  thereby  giving  the  reader  a  proper  clue  to 
the  argument  of  the  whole  work,  with  a  candid  and  open 
avowal  of  deficiencies,  is  the  proper  business  of  a  preface,  and 
of  a  writer  of  books.    .To  address  his  friend,  or  at  least  the 
reader,  with  cordiality   or  respect,  in  accordance  with  the 
spirit  of  the  production  ;  to  bespeak  his  favorable  notice,  or 
seek  to  avoid  unmerited  neglect,  is  the  province  of  the  dedi 
cation.     To  accomplish  these  ends,  a  recurrence  to  standard 
models  cannot  be  hurtful,  since  there  is   something   of  a 
formal,  and,  as  it  were,  of  artistical  etiquette  in  the  matter, 
and  which  is  not  to  be  lost  sight  of.     The  author,  who  is 
also  a  gentleman,  and  it  is  the  effect  of  letters  to  make  him 
such,  will  certainly  endeavor  to  carry  himself  with  as  genteel 
an  air  on  paper  as  in  company.     In  every  place,  he  will  ob 
serve  the  universal  laws  of  polite  regard  and  the  local  ob 
servances  of  conventional  decorum.     One  of  these  is  to  write 
a  preface  to  every  book  he  publishes,  which  should  also  be 
accompanied  by  a  dedication.     In  the  first,  he  addresses  the 
public ;  and  in  the  last  he  acknowledges  the  claims  of  private 
affection  or  personal  gratitude,  of  admiration  for  talents  or 
virtue  in  one  of  the  stars  of  contemporary  renown,  or  of  worth 
and  excellence  in  obscure  genius  and  unobtrusive  merit.    The 
preface  pleads,  apologizes,  defends  or  attacks  :  the  dedication 
conciliates  and  compliments.     Let  an  author  be  friendless 
and  humble,  he  still  can  appeal  to  the  "gentle"  reader  for 
sympathy  and  confidence. 


XXIX. 

RELIGIOUS      BIOGRAPHY. 

WE  believe  Dr.  Johnson  was  the  first  critic  to  complain  of 
the  "penury"  of  English  biography.  It  was  a  complaint  that 
savored  more  of  hastiness  and  ignorance  than  the  Doctor's 
contemporary  admirers  would  have  been  willing  to  allow  any 
reviewer  to  discover  in  him,  but  still  it  was  such ;  and  now 
that  every  pretender  to  criticism  makes  it  a  point  to  beard 
the  rough  but  manly  old  dogmatist,  we  may  allow  ourselves 
the  privilege  of  picking  an  additional  flaw  in  his  critical  repu 
tation  (almost  worn  out  by  repeated  attacks).  It  is  certain, 
for  his  undoubted  vigor  and  ability,  no  writer  of  eminence 
ever  made  so  many  and  such  gross  critical  blunders  as  Doctor 
Johnson.  On  real  life  and  domestic  morals ;  the  character 
and  manners  of  the  Londoners ;  the  hypocrisies  of  men  of  the 
world  ;  the  thin-skinned  sentimentalities  of  pretenders  to  sen 
timent  and  criticism,  he  exhibited  an  acuteness  of  observa 
tion,  a  comprehensiveness  of  judgment,  and  pungency  of 
satire,  that  have  never  been  surpassed.  But  in  the  field  of 
literary  criticism,  requiring  finer  tact  and  a  nicer  perception, 
the  grossness  of  his  senses,  no  less  than  the  obtuseness  of  his 
taste,  rendered  him  unfit,  physically  and  intellectually,  to 
judge  of  poets  and  men  of  fancy. 

In  the  rich  territory  of  old  English  literature,  there  is  not 
perhaps,  a  more  fruitful  province  than  that  of  biography,  not 
only  in  the  classic  form  of  lives,  but  also  memoirs,  diaries  and 
autobiography.  It  is  true  the  lives  most  generally  read  at 
present,  were  written  either  during  the  lifetime  or  since  the 
death  of  Johnson ;  as  in  the  former  period  the  classic  lives  of 
Goldsmith  and  Johnson,  and  the  memoirs  of  Cumberland, 


222  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

and  from  that  period  to  the  present  day,  among  heaps  of 
wretched  compilations,  we  must  distinguish  the  first  book  of 
the  kind  in  the  world,  Boswell's  Johnson,  the  learned  auto 
biography  of  Gibbon,  the  simple  yet  fascinating  lives  of  Hume 
and  Franklin,  honest  self-painters ;  the  classic  compendiums 
of  Southey,  the  lives  of  Burns  by  Currie  and  Lockhart,  and 
the  minor  sketches  of  Irving.  The  latest  permanent  work  of 
this  class  is  the  Memoirs  of  Leigh  Hunt.  And  yet  by  far 
the  richest  treasures  of  English  biography  are  to  be  found 
among  the  antiquarian  volumes  of  the  old  English  library . 
The  best  of  these  form  a  choice  list ;  classic  to  this  day. 
There  are  the  lives,  by  Burnet,  of  Hale  and  Rochester ;  the 
austere,  incorruptible  judge  and  pure  citizen,  and  the  lively, 
volatile  wit  and  libertine  subsiding  into  a  sober,  earnest 
Christian.  Walton's  lives  are  too  well  known  to  dilate  upon 
the  heroes  of  them  at  present ;  yet  what  a  noble  company  of 
poets,  divines  and  Christian  gentlemen  form  the  subjects  of 
his  volumes— Hooker,  and  Wotton,  and  Donne,  and  Herbert, 
and  Sanderson !  Zouch's  life  of  Walton  himself  is  fit  to  be 
included  as  the  humble  companion  of  these.  Then  we  have 
North's  life  of  Lord  Guildford,  full  of  lively  personal  strokes 
and  characters  of  the  great  lawyers  of  the  time  of  Charles  II. 
and  James  II.  Fenton's  lives  of  Milton  and  Waller— Fell's 
Hammond,  the  Fenelon  of  the  royalist  divines,  and  favorite 
chaplain  of  Charles  I.,  sharing  his  imprisonment  and  dan 
gers.  Among  the  latest  of  the  older  lives,  Doddridge's  Life 
of  Colonel  Gardiner,  of  which  we  shall  say  more  before  we 
conclude. 

The  French  have  the  reputation  of  being  the  best  memoir 
writers  in  the  world ;  yet  their  most  courtly  wits  have  not 
surpassed  Hamilton  in  his  pictures  of  the  royal  licentiousness 
of  the  age  of  Charles  II.,  and  Pepys  and  Evelyn.  The  me- 


RELIGIOUS    BIOGRAPHY. 


223 


raoirs  of  Colonel  Hutchinson  by  his  wife,  and  of  Venetia 
Digby,  the  beauty  of  her  day,  and  the  popular  toast,  despite 
her  doubtful  reputation,  by  the  quaint  fantast  Sir  Kenelin 
Digby,  are  at  least  a  fair  match  for  Bassompiere  and  Roche 
foucauld.  And  then,  as  repositories  of  facts  and  personal 
circumstances  nowhere  else  to  be  learned,  we  have  the  elabo 
rate  histories  of  Wood  and  Fuller,  Spence's  and  Aubrey's 
anecdotes,  and  the  letter  writers,  from  old  Howell  himself  to 
Pope  and  his  friends.  If  such  a  list  looks  like  "  penury,"  we 
should  like  to  learn  the  comparative  scale  by  which  "  wealth  " 
is  to  be  adjudged. 

A  fair  proportion  of  the  old  lives  are  those  of  good  Christ 
ians  without  pretence,  and  fine  scholars  without  presumption. 
Most  of  them,  too,  have  an  additional  value  as  models  for 
conduct:  Rochester  and  Gardiner  being  the  sole  instances  of 
"  men  that  need  repentance,"  and  they  both  converted  in 
the  heyday  of  the  vicious  career  in  which  they  were  em 
barked. 

So  much  by  way  of  preface— a  long  introduction  to  a  brief 
article.     We  have  selected  this  topic  to  point  out  the  preva 
lent  defects,  in  almost  every  work  of  the  kind  ;  defects,  too, 
springing  from  the  best   of  motives,  and  more  easily  dis 
covered  than  corrected.     In  the  best  of  the  old  lives  we  find 
this  ever-recurring  defect :  a  desire  to  paint  in  the  hero  of 
biography,  a  perfect  man ;   a  tendency  to   exaggerate  indi 
vidual  and  particular  merits,  by  the  force  of  contrast  with 
inferior  traits  in  much  inferior  characters.     The  writers  of 
lives,  in  all  times,  have  been  too  sparing  of  the  shade  in  their 
portraits.     A  profusion  of  light  falling  upon  the  admirable 
virtues,  allows  no  room  for  the  exhibition  of  defects.     Every 
trait  is  heightened ;  every  characteristic  marked  with  an  em- 


224  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

phasis  seldom  found  in  nature.     The  subjects  of  biography, 
like  the  heroes  of  novels,  are  too  often 

"  Faultless  monsters  whom  the  world  ne'er  saw." 

This  disgusts  the  thoughtful  reader,  whether   young  or 
old ;  for  the  youthful  student  soon  finds  these  pictures  dis 
proved  in  real  life,  and  the  sage  knows  their  unreality  while 
lie  is  perusing  the  page.    In  the  older  lives,  in  all  of  those  to 
which  we  have  referred,  a  saving  clause  may  be  inserted,  that 
the  subjects  of  the  writers  were  all  of  them  men  of  that  emni- 
ence  that  either  extravagant  praise  or  excessive  censure  soon 
corrected  itself.     For  one  would  report  differently  of  their 
lives  and  actions  from  another,  and  hence  a  balance  might 
easily  be  struck  between  them.    And  besides,  in  extenuation, 
we  may  offer  the  best  apology  for  the  biographer,  that  his 
hero  was  often  a  character  so  fascinating,  viewed  as  a  whole, 
that  it  was  very  excusable  to  overlook  minor  errors  and  petty 
defects.     All  of  Walton's  characters,  for  instance,  inevitably 
seduce  a  writer  into  encomium,  when  we  should  be  writing 
impartially ;   and  it  is  pleasanter,  as  well  as  easier,  to  pen  an 
eulogy  rather  than  a  life.     This  was  the  fault  that  Johnson 
accuses  Sprat  of  falling  into,*  and   a  fault  more  glaring  in 
Mrs.  Hutchinson's  book  than  in  most  of  the  old  lives,  and  less 
justifiable,  since  she  wrote  the  history  of  her  time,  as  well  as 
the  life  of  her  husband. 

Doddridge's  Life  of  Colonel  Gardiner  is  a  singular  speci 
men  of  this  class  of  books,  of  an  inferior  literary  value,  com- 
pard  with  the  rest,  but  still  excellent.  As  an  example  of  its 
class,  we  will  give  the  reader  a  summary  digest  of  its  con 
tents.  The  author,  a  nonconformist  divine  of  considerable 
reputation,  became  in  the  career  of  his  ministry  professionally 
*  Life  of  Cowley. 


RELIGIOUS    BIOGRAPHY.  225 

acquainted  and  intimately  connected  with  the  subject  of  his 
narrative,  who  was  a  royalist  officer,  a  colonel  of  dragoons. 
Gardiner  revealed  to  him  from  time  to  time  the  most  event 
ful  passages  of  his  life,  over  which  hung,  in  his  devout  im 
agination,  a  mystical  halo,  radiant  with  celestial  beauty.  He 
was  born  at  a  remarkable  period,  1688,  the  year  of  the  Eng 
lish  Revolution,  and  expired,  at  a  no  less  stirring  time,  on  the 
battle  rield  at  Preston  Pans,  when  the  partisans  of  the  house 
of  Stuart  "  were  out"  for  the  second  time,  in  '45. 

This  distinguished  officer  and  Christian  was  the  son  of  an 
officer  of  good  family,  who  fought  the  battles  of  his  country 
on  the  continent,  during  the  reign  of  William  III.,  and  of 
Anne,  after  him,  and  in  which  Marlborough  was  the  presid 
ing  military  genius  of  Great  Britain.  A  military  school,  with 
Marlborough  and  Eugene  at  its  head,  could  not  fail  of  turn 
ing  out  able  commanders  ;  and  of  these  Gardiner  was  one  of 
the  chief.  Brave,  to  a  daring  rashness,  he  had  all  the  splen 
did  qualities,  and  but  too  many  of  the  striking  vices,  of  the 
soldier.  Like  the  majority  of  celebrated  men,  who  have 
evinced  in  later  life  the  influence  of  early  education,  Gardiner 
was  fortunate  in  having  a  most  estimable  mother,  to  whoso 
guidance  and  example  he  was  wont  to  attribute  the  uncor- 
rupted  parts  of  his  character  and  temper.  Yet  ill  company, 
and  that  of  a  military  cast,  was  allowed  at  one  period  to  mas 
ter  the  original  good  qualities  of  his  nature,  and  taint  the 
purity  of  his  soul  with  the  tarnish  of  vice.  lie  early  fell 
into  gross  living,  swore  dreadfully,  cherished  a  malignant  spi 
rit  of  revenge — (before  the  age  of  twenty-one  ho  had  fought 
three  duels) — and  exhibited  even  a  ferocity,  that  became  so 
bered  down  into  manly  valor  and  Christian  resolution ;  so 
much  so,  that  in  middle  life  he  used  to  say,  "I  fear  sinning 
more  than  fighting!"  In  every  engagement  he  gained  ap- 
10* 


226  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

plause  for  skill,  no  less  than  courage,  since  he  scientifically 
practised  his  profession. 

Though  often  remonstrated  with,  and  even  sometimes 
alarming  by  his  horrid  imprecations  the  better  portion  of  his 
comrades,  he  still  went  on  in  his  evil  ways,  until  the  occur 
rence  of  what  he  speaks  of  as  a  vision  from  heaven,  and  would 
have  regarded  as  a  miracle.  To  fill  up  the  interval,  it  seems, 
one  morning,  previous  to  the  hour  appointed  for  meeting 
certain  of  his  associates  at  a  dinner  party,  he  took  up  one  of 
the  religious  works  with  a  quaint  title,  published  at  the  era 
of  the  Protectorate,  when  the  Puritans  were  in  fashion  and 
in  power.  He  read  to  ridicule,  but  was  suddenly  overpow 
ered  by  a  conviction,  awfully  indescribable,  of  his  wickedness, 
which  threw  him  into  a  sort  of  vision  or  trance,  during  which 
he  imagined,  as  we  construe  the  declaration,  that  he  saw  a 
living  representation  of  his  crucified  Master,  and  heard  the 
divine  voice,  in  tones  of  entreaty  and  to  this  purport,  "  Have 
I  not  suffered  this  for  thee  ?"  The  dream,  the  fancied  vision, 
or  what  you  will  call  it,  struck  him  with  profound  dismay, 
and  awakened  his  soul  to  the  consideration  of  its  state. 

From  this  period  he  was  another  man  :  strictly  pious,  re 
gular  in  every  habit,  loving  solitude  and  religious  conversa 
tion  and  prayer.  He  became  a  disciplinarian  of  the  noblest 
sort,  the  moral  teacher  as  well  as  commander  of  his  men. 
He  now  was  used  to  recount  the  wonderful  providences  (so  he 
termed  them)  of  his  life,  of  his  extraordinary  escapes,  of  be 
ing  wounded  in  the  mouth  just  after  uttering  a  horrid  oath, 
a  punishment  closely  consequent  on  his  offence  :  of  striking 
personal  deliverance  from  imminent  dangers.  A  good  man 
and  true  Christian  hero,  after  Steele's  model,  a  saint  militant, 
he  yet  was  not  without  a  besetting  defect — and  that  was  the 
excitability  of  his  religious  imagination.  He  dreamed  a 


RELIGIOUS    BIOGRAPHY.  227 

dream  of  following  across  the  part  of  a  field  his  Lord  and 
Saviour  :  he  made  a  prediction  of  the  death  of  the  king, 
which  turned  out  correct  Everything  with  him  was  mira 
culous,  and  a  little  heightened  by  (unconscious)  extrava 
gance.  No  doubt  he  was  sincere  :  the  only  question  is,  if  he 
was  not  a  self-deceiver.  A  sudden  conversion,  an  opportune 
deliverance,  is  sufficient  to  turn  the  head  of  the  wisest  man. 
We  think  that,  like  Donne's  extraordinary  vision  of  his  wife 
and  dear  child,  his  vision  was  the  waking  dream  of  an  im 
aginative  mind. 

Whether  imagination  or  reality  presided  on  these  occa 
sions,  still  he  remained  consistent  and  firm  :  unlike  Volney 
and  those  cowardly  blasphemers,  who  take  back  in  a  moment 
of  security  what  they  uttered  in  the  hour  of  danger.  Ever 
these  circumstances  remained  before  him,  a  cloud  by  day  and 
a  pillar  of  fire  by  night,  to  guide  his  faltering  steps.  A  lofty 
confidence  elevated  the  hopes  and  daily  walk  of  the  happy 
man,  who  considered  himself  blessed  in  beholding  the  coun 
tenance  of  his  Saviour  and  friend. 

With  the  mass,  the  love  for  the  miraculous,  for  prophecy, 
for  mysteries,  is  more  a  false  state,  a  mere  religious  stimulant, 
and  not  the  healthy  action  of  a  vigorous  soul.  But  it  was 
not  so  with  him. 

Gardiner  died  the  death  of  a  soldier  and  a  Christian,  on 
the  field  of  battle,  and  in  the  arms  of  victory,  an  officer  of 
the  generous  strain  of  Gustavus  Adolphus ;  and  like  that  lion 
of  the  North,  high-toned,  exact,  judicious,  and  sincere,  he 
fought  the  good  fight  of  faith,  and  left  behind  him  a  sweet 
remembrance  in  the  hearts  of  all,  as  a  brave  and  accomplish 
ed  officer,  a  steadfast  Christian,  a  good  man,  and  a  courteous 
gentleman — Rcquiescat  in  pace. 

To  return  to  the  general   subject:  for  modern  religious 


228  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

biography,  we  entertain  no  great  favor.  The  writers  of  it 
are  in  most  cases  ill-fitted  for  their  task,  and  indeed  quite 
unpractised  in  composition.  Southey's  Wesley  (a  philosophi 
cal  history  of  Methodism)  and  Heber's  life  of  Taylor  are  the 
only  two  classic  works  in  this  department,  of  the  nineteenth 
century,  we  can,  at  present,  recall.  The  lives  of  most  mis 
sionaries  are  more  interesting  for  the  satistical  information 
they  contain  than  for  aught  else.  Missionaries  should  be 
good  travel  writers,  yet  we  find  only  a  single  Borrow  among 
them.  The  subjects  of  religious  biography  are  in  most  cases 
good  enough  people,  but  quite  unworthy  of  being  embalmed 
for  the  admiration  of  posterity.  The  embalming  is  thrown 
away,  for  they  never  reach  posterity.  An  eminently  great 
and  good  man,  an  exemplar  of  faith  and  charity,  should  never 
be  allowed  to  pass  out  of  the  memories  of  men,  cannot  be 
forgotten ;  he  will  live  in  tradition,  if  not  in  printed  books. 
But  many  good,  humble  Christians  die  daily,  whom  it  is  by 
no  means  essential  to  write  the  lives  of;  whom  it  rather  hurts 
the  interests  of  religion,  and  certainly  of  literature  (consider 
ed  purely  as  such)  to  make  unduly  prominent.  The  facts  of 
their  lives  are  few  ;  they  have  done  little  to  affect  the  rest  of 
mankind ;  their  greatest  victories  (silent  and  obscure)  have 
been  over  themselves  (the  noblest  of  victories),  and  their  pro- 
foundest  discoveries  have  been  of  the  wickedness  of  their 
own  hearts.  These  facts,  to  the  individual  of  all  others  the 
most  important,  still  have  little  interest  for  the  world  at 
large.  The  story  of  the  Christian's  life  is  told  in  two  words, 
Repentance  and  Love.  Now,  unless  striking  instances  occur, 
or  curious  details  are  presented,  a  religious  life,  of  all  others, 
presents  very  little  to  interest  even  the  most  sympathizing 
intelligent)  reader. 
The  injury  done  to  literature  by  a  flood  of  religious  lives  is 


RELIGIOUS    BIOGRAPUY.  229 

clear :  standard  works  of  the  highest  character  are  neglected 
for  a  new  biography  of  the  least  value  ;  corruptions  of  style 
become  frequent,  and  essentially  impair  the  idiomatic  graces 
of  our  tongue.  Inferior  models  of  excellence  are  held  up, 
to  the  exclusion  of  the  most  excellent ;  cant  is  prevalent ; 
at  first  unconscious,  it  becomes  at  last  confirmed  and  hypo 
critical. 

Let  no  serious  reader  think  we  underrate  the  humblest  vir 
tues  of  the  patient  Christian.  We  reverence  piety  in  the 
garb  of  the  beggar  ;  we  believe  it  to  add  a  crowning  glory  to 
the  wisest  head.  Yet  we  protest  against  an  indiscriminate 
record  of  the  private  lives  of  Christians,  who  have  not  some 
other  claim  on  the  universal  attention  of  mankind.  Want 
of  literature  is  not,  however,  the  only  want  of  many,  both 
of  the  subjects  and  authors,  of  religious  lives ;  many 
have  wanted  real  humility,  many  have  in  a  secret  self- 
praise  elevated  themselves  above  the  rest  of  mankind,  and 
thought  a  publication  of  their  conversion  and  religious  ex 
perience,  necessary  for  the  salvation  of  the  world.  With 
such  we  can  pretend  to  have  no  patience,  since  we  believe 
that  they  are  self-deluded  after  all,  and  rather  to  be  pitied 
than  admirred. 

The  sincere  Christian  need  not  fear  oblivion.  Unknown 
to  men,  he  is  not  forgotten  by  his  heavenly  Father  ;  and  if 
his  life  is  not  told  in  the  perishable  books  of  human  authors, 
his  name  is  nevertheless  registered  in  the  Book  of  Life. 


XXX. 


TITLES . 


WE  Americans  have  been  ridiculed  for  our  extravagant  ad" 
miration  of  titles,  with  more  of  justice  than  most  of  us  are  at 
all  willing  to  allow.  Notwithstanding  our  republican  spirit, 
in  government  and  political  rights,  we  still,  as  a  nation,  en 
tertain  a  vast  respect  for  forms,  ceremonies,  honors,  grave 
respects. 

The  most  laughable  part  of  the  matter,  too,  is  found  in  the 
fact,  that  a  people  characteristically  pacific,  both  from  in 
clination  and  policy,  should  affect  such  a  violent  attachment 
for  military  titles,  with  all  the  pomp  and  insignia  of  war. 
Every  petty  mechanic  may  become,  and  often  is,  a  captain  or 
major.  ^  Your  host  at  the  tavern  is  colonel :  the  blacksmith 
of  the  village,  perhaps  a  general— sometimes  a  GREENE.  The 
persons  holding  these  offices  are  frequently  among  the  mildest 
of  men,  probably  so  timid  as  to  run,  in  actual  conflict,  at  the 
report  of  artillery.  Our  city  and  country  militia  would 
hardly  stand  before  a  disciplined  army— save  and  excepting 
always,  in  a  defensive  national  war,  and  then  cowards  would 
be  converted  into  heroes.  We  do  not  speak  of  such  an  emer 
gency,  but  refer  to  the  soldierly  character  of  our  people.  A 
mere  soldier  of  fortune  fights  equally  well,  or  ill,  everywhere, 
under  every  government ;  but  Americans  are  soldiers  from 
necessity,  and  at  home.  There  they  would  act  like  brave 
men,  as  they  always  have  done. 

English  writers  have  noticed  this  mock  heroic  trait  in  our 
people ;  but  they  have  not  remarked  that  the  admiration  for 
titles  is  as  common  in  the  line  of  civil  as  of  military  life.  We 
are  equally  open  to  satire  on  that  side,  also.  A  judge  of  a 


TITLES.  231 

county  court  is  with  us  a  great  man  ;  and,  indeed,  a  judge- 
ship  is  generally  the  mark  of  a  country  gentleman's  ambition. 
One  of  our  Presidents,  after  filling  the  highest  office,  became 
the  justice  of  one  of  the  Virginia  county  courts. 

The  thirst  for  office  and  titular  distinctions  is  not,  however, 
confined  to  the  country.  At  a  charter  election,  what  a  rivalry 
for  the  petty  offices  of  the  wards.  Irving,  in  his  satire  on  the 
Dutch  burgomaster  and  schepens,  has  painted  with  exact 
fidelity,  our  contemporary  aldermen  and  their  assistants. 
These  are  the  smallest  in  general  of  our  little  great  men. 
What  a  turkey-cock  is  a  true  alderman  of  this  class  !  not 
the  official  performing  his  regular  duties,  and  carefully  watch 
ing  the  interests  and  comfort  of  his  ward,  but  the  mere  beef 
eater,  the  pursy,  swelling,  pompous  ignoramus.  Elected  by 
those  who  have  some  design  upon  his  pockets,  or  at  least  his 
patronage ;  consorting  with  his  kind,  and  thinking  with 
them,  he  has  nothing  to  do  but  to  eat  rich  dinners  (at  the 
almshouse  for  sick  and  poor)  and  talk  in  an  imperative 
style,  the  autocrat  of  the  side  walks,  of  the  church  where  he 
attends,  for  a  comfortable  nap  of  a  summer's  afternoon,  of  the 
tradesmen  he  deigns  to  employ,  and  of  the  barber's  shop, 
where  he  is  first  shaved  in  the  morning,  and  reads  all  the 
papers  through,  keeping  a  shop  full  waiting,  while  he  toils 
through  the  advertisements.  The  terror  of  beggars  and  of 
petty  criminals,  hard-hearted,  a  usurer,  a  rigorous  landlord, 
without  any  bowels  of  mercy. 

To  leave  such  reflections  as  these,  which  are  somewhat  out 
of  place  here  in  a  gossiping  essay,  a  strong  objection  to  the 
employment  of  titles  is  the  very  inadequate  character  they 
bear.  The  Right  Honorable  gentleman  may  be,  and  often 
ought  to  be,  called  a  most  dishonorable  traitor.  The  Re 
verend  brother  is  not  always  deserving  of  reverence,  nor  the 


232  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

learned  advocate  always  a  model  of  legal  attainments.  These 
titles  and  epithets  are,  for  the  most  part,  unmeaning,  and 
often  savor  of  downright  irony.  By  a  title  is  often  implied 
much  more  than  is  actually  meant ;  and  like  the  bishop's 
lawn,  the  marshal's  truncheon,  and  the  judge's  ermine,  are 
considered  the  correlatives  of  piety,  courage,  and  incoruptible 
integrity.  Yet  they  afford,  in  general,  merely  the  substitutes 
for  those  qualities.  Titles  are  worshipped  by  "the  great 
vulgar  and  the  small,"  who  are  in  the  habit  of  taking  the 
name  for  the  thing.  To  carry  any  weight  with  it,  a  title 
should  infer  some  particular  merit,  as  the  valor  of  a  hero,  or 
the  wisdom  of  a  counsellor.  It  should  have  the  effect  of  a 
judicious  epithet :  sometimes  a  sublime  description,  as  in  the 
list  of  titles  of  the  Saviour  of  mankind.  It  should  serve  as  a 
designation.  But  what  mean  the  titles  of  courts  ?  The 
"  Grace,"  for  instance,  of  a  duke,  or  an  archbishop  ;  or  the 
"  Serenity"  of  a  petty  German  prince.  They  can  be  borne 
by  good  and  bad  men,  indiscriminately.  The  true  title  must 
be  earned;  the  reward  of  merit  .is  worthless,  conferred  as  an 
act  of  favor.  Artificial  rank  can  be  created.  Nature  only 
can  form  the  true  nobleman.  Kings,  we  are  told,  can  make 
or  unmake,  princes  or  lords,  who  may  flourish  or  may  fade  ; 

"  But  a  bold  peasantry,  their  country's  pride, 
When  once  destroyed,  can  never  be  supplied." 

Or,  as  Burns  nobly  sings : — 

"  A  prince  can  mak'  a  belted  knight, 
A  marquis,  duke,  and  a'  that ; 
But  an  honeat  man  's  aboon  his  might, 
Gude  faith,  he  maunna  fa'  that." 


TITLES.  233 

The  noblest  of  titles,  gentleman,  not  the  artificial  designation, 
but  the  highest  perfection  of  the  manly  character,  cannot  be 
created  by  letters  patent.  Ho  must  bo  born  one,  with  a  clear 
head,  a  warm  heart,  a  noble  will,  and  a  gentle  soul,  invincible 
by  fortune  or  circumstance.  Thus  averse,  among  his  other 
genuine  traits  of  manhood,  is  the  true  gentleman  to  all  titular 
distinctions ;  whose  character  Dekkar  has  finely  drawn  in  a 
passage  descriptive  of  the  perfect  character  of  the  Divine  word. 

"  The  first  of  nun  that  e'er  wore  earth  about  him  was  a  sufferer, 
A  soft,  meek,  patient,  humble,  tranquil  spirit, 
The  first  true  gentleman  that  ever  lived," 

The  gentleman  and  the  Christian  knight  are  here  one,  as 
they  always  should  be,  united  in  the  same  character.  Yet 
how  unlike  the  ordinary  notion  of  a  spirited,  showy  gallant, 
or  overbearing  aristocrat.  Man,  simply,  is  a  sufficiently  lofty 
title  :  a  true  man  is  the  first  of  created  beings.  One  of  Shak- 
speare's  characters  nobly  says  : — 

"I  tell  thee,  sirrah,  I  write  man,  to  which  title  no  age  can 
bring  thee."  Neither,  we  may  add,  can  any  amount  of 
wealth,  degree  of  power,  extent  of  ability,  or  elevation  of 
office,  if  the  heart  and  soul  be  wanting. 

The  admiration  of  titles  is  something  childish,  and  pertain 
ing  to  a  state  of  barbarism.  The  names  and  singular  appel 
lations  borne  by  our  native  Indians,  as  well  as  by  the  savage 
tribes  of  other  countries,  illustrate  this  position,  and  are  more 
worthy  of  attention,  from  their  real  meaning,  than  the  family 
crests  of  civilized  nations,  at  the  present  day,  with  all  the 
trumpery  of  the  Heralds'  College. 

The  facility  of  obtaining  certain  titles,  from  literary  insti 
tutions,  and  the  ordinary  academic  degrees,  has  taken  off  the 


234  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

edge  of  novelty,  and  rendered  them  very  commonplace  dig 
nities.  You  find  as  many  doctors  of  divinity  as  of  medicine, 
and  masters  of  arts  abound  almost  as  much  as  simple  ba 
chelors.  In  most  instances,  the  titles  are  sadly  misapplied. 
The  teachers  are  learners,  and  the  masters  mere  tyros.  Al 
most  as  great  a  farce  as  college  degrees — we  speak  it  sub 
rosA — are  the  degrees  of  masonry,  the  sublime  degree  of  this, 
and  the  incomprehensible  degree  of  that.  Now-a-days,  they 
do  read  absurdly,  to  be  sure,  in  a  Masonic  Register,  the 
names  of  honest,  plain  mechanics,  as  High-Priests,  Grand 
Kings,  Scribes  and  Sojourners — Sir  John  Johnson  of  such  an 
encampment,  Right  Worshipful  of  such  a  chapter,  &c.  One 
respectable  sexton  we  find  a  High  Priest,  and  the  same  office 
sustained  by  a  noted  political  ballad  singer.  Speculative 
masonry,  a  benevolent  and  prudential  system,  in  its  origin, 
fitly  and  impressively  exhibited  by  figures  and  symbols, 
affords,  abstractedly  and  in  practice,  a  wise  and  striking  com 
mentary  on  the  Christian  morality.  But  the  multitude  of 
signs,  and  the  grave  burlesque  of  (the  reported)  ceremonies, 
no  less  than  the  number,  names  and  functions  of  several  of 
the  officers,  have  a  tendency  to  degrade  into  ridicule  what 
was  most  praiseworthy  in  its  first  intention. 

The  violent  contrast  between  the  ordinary  civil  occupations, 
and  the  elevated  titl«s  of  the  Masonic  Dignitaries,  is  the  cause 
of  the  comic  effect  produced  on  hearing  them  recited.  It  is 
like  making  Sancho  Governor  of  Barataria,  or  dubbing  poor 
Saltonstall  Duke  of  Rigmarole.  We  are  apt  to  look  upon 
many  titles  as  mere  nicknames,  intended  by  way  of  satirical 
jest  upon  pretension  and  affectation  :  often  a  serious  joke,  im 
perceptible  to  the  party  most  concerned  in  extinguishing  it. 
To  modern  sceptics,  the  high-flown  style  of  addressing  certain 
of  the  scholastic  doctors  was  of  this  nature ;  they  were  uni 
formly  irrefragable,  sublime,  invincible,  celestial. 


TITLES.  235 

From  a  couple  of  papers  in  D'Israeli's  collection  of  curios 
ities,  we  glean  a  few  facts  relative  to  the  origin  of  certain 
Royal  titles.  "  Illustrious"  was  never  given  save  to  those 
who  merited  the  epithet,  until  the  time  of  Constantino.  The 
salutation  "  Your  Grace"  was  the  first  form  of  salutation. 
"Your  Highness"  came  next  into  vogue.  Henry  VIII.  is 
said  to  have  been  the  first  monarch  who  assumed  it.  The 
title  "  Majesty"  was  accorded  (for  the  first  time)  by  Francis 
I.,  to  the  same  sovereign,  in  their  celebrated  interview  on  the 
Field  of  the  Cloth  of  Gold.  Selden  thought  a  king  of  En 
gland  should  be  styled  Emperor. 

Our  own  countrymen  are  not  the  only  people  who  are  apt 
to  be  captivated  by  "  the  glory  of  a  name."  We  have  no 
orders  of  nobility  [the  Governor  and  Lieut.-Governor  of  Mas 
sachusetts  are  the  only  public  functionaries,  in  this  country, 
provided  by  law,  with  titles  of  Honor],  and  ought  to  be  free 
from  any  charge  of  man-worship  :  hero-worship  is  another 
thing,  and  always  existing,  should  be  perpetually  cherished 
in  every  community.  The  Spaniards  formerly,  and  the  Ger 
mans  of  the  present  day,  are  the  nations  most  notorious  for 
titled  orders.  We  knew  a  German  barber,  of  this  city,  who 
held  his  credentials  and  patent  of  Baron.  French  Count  is 
almost  a  synonyme  for  unprincipled  adventurer.  The  English 
entertain  a  deep  and  instinctive  respect  for  their  nobility. 
The  Spanish  Don  is  the  proudest  gentleman  in  Europe. 

These  Spaniards,  at  one  period  during  the  glorious  epoch 
of  their  history,  from  the  reign  of  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  to 
the  conclusion  of  that  of  Philip  III.,  accumulated  titles  and 
modesgof  address,  with  points  of  etiquette  and  precedence,  to 
such  an  extent  as  to  make  it  necessary  to  publish,  in  a  volume, 
the  indispensable  forms.  The  king  of  Spain,  at  that  time, 
claimed  as  many  titles  as  the  Grand  Seignor,  whose  address 


236  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

fills  several  pages.  The  natural  stateliness  of  the  Castilian 
would  allow  of  no  remission  of  dignity.  He  had,  then,  rather 
be  robbed  by  a  courteous  footpad,  who  approached  him  with 
"  all  the  honors"  of  the  road,  than  be  substantially  aided  by 
a  rude  despiser  of  ceremonies.  Conversations  must  have  been 
then  less  an  interchange  of  sentiment  or  repartee  than  an  ela 
borate  contest  of  external  civilities.  Incidentally,  the  chivalric 
soldier  or  bold  navigator  caught  this  passion  for  pomp  and 
magnificence,  from  oriental  discovery  and  conquest  or  coloniza 
tion  ;  but  an  original  basis  was  to  be  found  in  the  national 
character,  which  was  attracted  by  the  noble,  the  splendid,  and 
the  grand ;  and  which  contained  the  elements  of  all  these. 

At  this  present  epoch,  the  Germans  appear  to  be  the  most 
smitten   with   a  love  of  titles.     It  is,  indeed,  a  passion.     The 
great  nation,  which  has  produced  the  greatest  literary  artists 
of  this  century,  the  profoundest  inquirers,  the  most  learned 
scholars,  still  cherishes  the  baubles  of  office,  and  is  pleased 
with  the  decoration   of  a  ribbon  or   a  medal.      The  most 
knowing  have  their  foibles :  there  are  "  follies  of  the  wise." 
The  various  classes  of  German  titles  are  endless,  and  are  not 
less  remarkable  than  their  singularity  and  application.    There 
are  titles  of  rank  and  of  office— Rath,  or  Counsellor,  is  the 
commonest  of  these ;  and  of  this  there  are  several  grades.     Of 
schoolmasters   there   are   many   ranks— Rector,   Sub-rector, 
Primus,  Secundus,  Tertius,  Quartus,  Quintus,  &c.,  &c.,  &c. 
The  Professor  is  ordinarius  and  extra-ordinarius.     Most  of 
them  are  extraordinary  enough,  in  all  conscience.     They  pro 
fess  every  imaginable  department  of  learning,  even  to  Car- 
lyle's  and  Jean  Paul's  Professors  of  Things  in  General.     These 
Germans,  too,  even  confer  on  the  wife  the  husband's  title,  as 
Mrs.  Court  Counsellor,  and  the  like.     Goethe's  mother,  we 
learn,  from  Bettine,  was  always  styled  Frau-Rath. 


TITLES.  237 

Even  one  bearing  no  distinct  title  is  always  styled  as  Mr. 
in  every  instance — not  as  we  employ  the  term,  but  Mr.  Car 
penter,  Blacksmith,  or  Grocer,  as  the  case  may  be.  The 
Chinese  are,  perhaps,  beyond  all  nations  in  their  passion  for 
honors,  but  we  have  not  been  able  to  gain  any  particular  de 
tails,  from  the  general  descriptions.  The  number  of  manda 
rins  is  said  to  be  immense,  and  their  authority  with  the  peo 
ple  almost  unbounded. 

To  turn  to  the  philosophy  of  our  subject,  and  leave  curious 
facts.  Modern  titles,  or  rather  modern  aristocracy,  a  relic  of 
feudalism,  arose  out  of  a  military  aristocracy.  Originally, 
they  were  the  natural  offspring  of  despotism  and  conquest- 
They  were  intended  to  dazzle  only  to  enslave,  or  to  quote  the 
gist  of  the  whole  matter,  as  it  is  admirably  summed  up  in  the 
Rights  of  Man  (Vol.  II.,  p.  86).  The  writer  has  been  dilating 
upon  the  law  of  primogeniture,  and  thus  proceeds  to  describe 
the  character  of  the  aristocracy  growing  out  of  it  The  pas 
sage  is  remarkable  for  condensed  thought  and  terse  expression. 
"  The  nature  and  character  of  aristocracy  shows  itself  to  us  in 
this  law.  It  is  a  law  against  every  law  of  nature,  and  nature 
herself  calls  for  its  destruction.  Establish  family  justice  and 
aristocracy  falls.  By  the  aristocratical  law  of  primogeniture, 
in  a  family  of  six,  five  are  exposed.  Aristocracy  never  has 
but  one  child.  The  rest  are  begotten  to  be  devoured.  They 
are  thrown  to  the  cannibal  for  prey,  and  the  natural  parent 
prepares  the  unnatural  repast.  As  everything  which  is  out 
of  nature  in  man  affects,  more  or  less,  the  interests  of  society 
so  does  this.  All  the  children  which  the  aristocracy  disowns 
[which  are  all  except  the  oldest],  are,  in  general,  cast  like  or 
phans  on  a  parish,  to  be  provided  for  by  the  public,  but  at  a 
greater  charge.  Unnecessary  offices  and  places  in  govern 
ments  and  courts  are  created  at  the  expense  of  the  public  to 


238  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

maintain  them.  With  what  kind  of  parental  reflections  can 
the  father  or  mother  contemplate  their  younger  offspring  ?  By 
nature  they  are  children,  and  by  marriage  they  are  heirs ;  but 
by  aristocracy  they  are  bastards  and  orphans.  They  are  the 
flesh  and  blood  of  their  parents  in  one  line,  and  akin  to  them 
in  the  other.  To  restore,  therefore,  parents  to  their  children, 
and  children  to  their  parents,  relations  to  each  other,  and  man 
to  society,  and  to  exterminate  the  monster  aristocracy,  root 
and  branch,  the  French  constitution  has  destroyed  the  line  of 
primogeniture.  Here,  then,  lies  the  monster,  and  Mr.  Burke, 
if  he  pleases,  may  write  its  epitaph." 

Yet  arbitrary  and  intolerant  as  Aristocracy  is  too  apt  to  be 
and  has  generally  been  found — too  often  an  overbearing  des 
potism,  still  we,  sometimes,  in  our  visions  of  the  future, 
imagine  a  possible  Aristocracy,  composed  purely  of  the  wisest 
and  most  virtuous,  those  intended  by  Nature  and  Nature's  God 
to  direct  their  fellows  and  animate  their  generous  aspirations 
into  manly  action.  This  is,  however,  a  state  to  be  hoped  for 
rather  than  expected  with  confidence.  The  Aristocracy  of 
the  present  is  too  much  the  creature  of  circumstance  to  de 
serve  our  regard.  It  is  not  a  self-dependent,  bold  and  intel 
ligent  rule.  It  looks  here  at  wealth,  and  inquires  not  if  a 
man  is  worthy,  but  how  much  he  is  worth.  The  best  men 
are  they  who  are  good  for  the  greatest  amount.  Their 
maxim  is,  "  wealth  makes  the  MAN — the  want  of  it,  the  FEL 
LOW."  If  the  aristocracy  of  birth  be  considered,  it  looks  not 
to  the  excellent  qualities  of  a  man's  own  parents  or  imme 
diate  family  (as  an  ordinary  thing),  it  rather  investigates  the 
antiquity  of  his  house  (the  character  of  his  immediate  pre 
decessors  does  not  avail  so  much),  and  the  long  line  of  de 
scent  from  a  famous  original.  Its  glory  is  retrospective  and 
traditional ;  and  noble  as  that  may  be  as  an  incentive  to  in- 


TITLES.  239 

dividual  performance,  it  can,  notwithstanding,  never  claim  the 
force  of  a  substitute  for  them.  True  democracy  may,  how 
ever,  consist',  and  ought  to  be  accompanied  by  true  gentle- 
manliness.  That  they  thus  always  do  not  agree  is  no  argu 
ment  against  the  possible  union.  Democracy  is  a  principle 
(political,  not  social),  and  does  not  depend  upon  the  dress  or 
pursuits  or  accomplishments  of  the  individual  professing  it. 
It  is  a  philanthropic  and  philosophic  system  of  polity,  wholly 
irrespective  of  personal  habits  or  prejudices.  It  is  the  gov 
ernment  of  the  people  by  themselves.  Of  this  great  body, 
the  leaders  (for  the  mass  cannot  act  as  one  man,  and  must 
delegate  duties  and  assign  powers)  are  expected  to  be  in  ad 
vance,  socially  and  intellectually,  if  not  also  morally  and 
politically  of  their  fellows,  else  why  leaders  ?  And  we  find 
as  matter  of  history,  the  staunchest  advocates  of  liberal  views 
and  free  government  at  all  times,  and  especially  in  the  most 
excited  times,  to  have  been  able  men,  good  patriots  and  gen 
tlemen — to  look  at  Lafayette  in  France  ;  Sidney  and  Russell 
and  Hampden  in  England  ;  and  all  of  our  own  great  Revo 
lutionary  characters  without  exception.  Not  to  dilate  upon 
obvious  truths,  we  shall  conclude  this  sketch  with  an  extract 
from  the  Rights  of  Man  on  the  abolition  of  titles  in  France, 
at  the  framing  of  their  new  constitution — a  masterly  passage, 
equal  to  certain  of  Burke's  noblest  efforts,  and  which  con 
tains  the  spirit  of  the  whole  matter.  "  Titles  are  but  a  nick 
name,  and  every  nickname  is  a  title.  The  thing  is  perfectly 
harmless  in  itself,  but  it  marks  a  certain  foppery  in  the  hu 
man  character  that  degrades  it.  It  renders  man  diminutive 
in  things  which  are  little.  It  talks  about  its  fine  riband  like 
a  girl,  and  shows  its  garters  like  a  child.  A  certain  writer 
of  some  antiquity,  says,  '  when  I  was  a  child,  I  thought  as  a 
child ;  but  when  I  became  a  man,  I  put  away  childish 
things.' 


240  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

"  It  is  properly  from  the  elevated  mind  of  France  that 
the  folly  of  titles  has  been  abolished.  It  has  outgrown  the 
baby  clothes  of  Count  and  Duke,  and  breeched  itself  into 
manhood.  France  has  not  levelled,  it  has  exalted.  It  has 
put  down  the  dwarf  to  set  up  the  man.  The  insignificance 
of  a  senseless  and  noble  Duke,  Count  or  Earl  has  ceased  to 
please.  Even  those  who  possessed  them  have  disowned  the 
gibberish,  and  as  they  outgrow  the  rickets  have  despised  the 
rattle.  The  genuine  mind  of  man  thirsting  for  its  native 
home,  society,  contemns  the  gew-gaws  that  separate  him 
from  it.  Titles  are  like  circles  drawn  by  the  magician's 
wand,  to  contract  the  sphere  of  man's  felicity.  He  lives  im 
mortal  within  the  Bastile  of  a  name,  and  surveys  at  a  dis 
tance  the  envied  life  of  man. 

"  Is  it  then  any  wonder  that  titles  should  fall  in  France  ? 
Is  it  not  a  great  wonder  that  they  should  be  kept  up  any 
where  ?  What  are  they  ?  What  is  their  worth,  nay,  what 
is  their  amount  ?  When  we  think  or  speak  of  a  judge  or 
general,  we  associate  with  it  the  ideas  of  office  and  character ; 
we  think  of  purity  in  the  one  and  bravery  in  the  other ;  but 
when  we  use  a  word  merely  as  a  title,  no  ideas  associate  with 
it.  Through  all  the  vocabulary  of  names,  there  is  not  such 
an  animal  as  a  Duke  or  a  Count ;  neither  can  we  connect 
any  certain  idea  of  the  word.  Whether  they  mean  strength 
or  weakness,  wisdom  or  folly,  a  child  or  a  man,  or  a  rider  or 
a  horse,  is  all  equivocal.  What  respect,  then,  can  be  paid  to 
that  which  describes  nothing  and  means  nothing  ?  Imagina 
tion  has  given  figure  and  character  to  centaurs,  satyrs,  and 
down  to  all  the  fairy  tribe  ;  but  titles  baffle  even  the  powers 
of  fancy,  and  are  a  chimerical  nondescript." 

Acute  sense,  enlivened  by  antithesis,  and  condensed  into 
the  form  of  pointed  maxims,  cannot  in  pungency  and  effect 


TITLES.  241 

transcend  this  spirited  tirade.  Indeed,  there  are  not  many 
passages,  even  in  Burke's  celebrated  Reflections,  which  called 
forth  this  reply,  that  surpass  the  above  episode,  in  compressed 
power  and  epigrammatic  point.  We  have  looked  in  vain 
into  the  journals  of  the  first  Congress  and  the  secret  debates, 
lately  printed,  for  a  discussion  on  the  proper  title  by  which 
to  address  the  President  of  the  United  States — whether  His 
Excellency,  or  by  what  other  designation.*  We  looked  into 
this  matter  at  the  suggestion  of  one  far  better  fitted  than  our 
selves,  from  his  political  studies,  to  resolve  this  problem.  Yet 
it  may  be  allowed  to  the  generous  advocate  of  the  poor 
criminal,  the  humane  legislator,  to  be  slightly  acquainted 
with  what,  at  present,  is  no  more  than  a  piece  of  antiquarian 
curiosity.  Human  life  and  human  improvement  is  of  more 
consequence  than  titles  of  honor,  and  the  abolition  of  capital 
punishment  than  a  matter  of  form  or  of  courtly  address. 

It  is  to  be  hoped  that  beyond  the  necessary  terms  of  offi 
cial  appellation,  titles  will  never  be  employed  in  this  country, 
purely  as  stereotyped  honorary  epithets  or  unmeaning  honors. 
We  want  men,  not  a  nobility.  We  would  honor  greatness 
and  goodness,  virtue  and  talent  untitled,  far  rather  than  title 
without  either  of  these  claims  to  attention  and  respect.  We 
require  the  thing,  and  not  the  name.  If  we  must  have  su 
perfluous  titles,  let  them  be  badges  of  dishonor,  and  to  bo 
avoided  by  every  good  man,  good  citizen,  and  true  American. 

*  NOTE. — Since  writing  the  above,  we  have  been  kindly 
referred  to  the  proper  volume.  In  the  Journals  of  the  Senate 
for  the  year  '89,  the  question  is  discussed,  of  which  only  a» 
brief  minute  remains.  The  debate  lasted  a  week  or  more, 
during  which  the  titles  of  Excellency  and  of  His  Highness, 
the  Protector  of  our  Liberties,  were  proposed,  but  objected  to. 
The  latter  title  was  too  much  Cromwellian  and  monarchical 
11 


242  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

perhaps,  for  even  the  so-called  black-cockade  federalist.  And, 
finally,  the  simple  and  appropriate  address  was  resolved  on 
of,  the  President  of  the  United  States. 


XXXI. 

ESSAYES  AND  CHARACTERES  OF  A  PRISON  AND  PRISONERS  : 
BY  GEFFRAY  MINSHULL,  OF  GRAYES-INN,  GENT. 

THE  object  of  this  rare  treatise,  which  is  rather  a  collection 
of  several  short  characters  and  fragmentary  disquisitions,  is 
to  paint  Life  in  Prison,  and  from  the  internal  evidence  it 
affords,  no  less  than  the  later  accounts  of  Howard,  Buxton 
and  Mrs.  Fry,  we  dare  affirm  it  to  be  a  very  faithful  picture. 
Though  modern  philanthropy  has  effected  much  for  the  im 
provement  of  prison  discipline,  and  the  ameliorated  condition 
of  prisoners,  yet  still,  in  certain  prominent  particulars,  a  de 
scription  of  a  prison  more  than  two  centuries  ago,  must  an 
swer  to  a  description  of  the  same  place,  at  the  present  day. 
Dark,  gloomy  walls,  barred  windows,  guards,  jailors,  locks, 
confinement,  silence,  are  the  outward  marks  of  the  prison, 
now  as  then.  To  be  sure,  the  buildings  are  better,  may  be 
more  elegantly  constructed,  are  much  cleaner,  less  turbulent ; 
still  a  sense  of  solitude,  a  feeling  of  closeness,  reigns  within 
its  precincts.  The  mere  personal  condition  of  prisoners  is,  in 
'many  respects,  far  preferable  to  what  it  was  once.  Yet,  in 
these  respects  even,  what  great  improvements  still  remain  to 
be  discovered  and  applied.  But  in  more  important  points 
the  system  is  little  bettered.  The  prison  chaplain,  though 
(we  trust)  a  different  personage  from  the  Newgate  ordinary 


243 

in  Fielding's  time,  is  still  ill  paid,  and  altogether  on  a  wrong 
footing.  Intellectual  light  is  virtually  excluded  from  prisons, 
where  even  freedom  of  thought  might  be  considered  an  in 
fringement  on  the  rules  and  restraints  of  the  place. 

In  despite  of  all  the  works  of  benevolence,  and  especially 
of  those  deeds  that  tend  to  prevent  the  commission  of  crime, 
it  is  to  be  feared  prisons  must  ever  be  filled.  There  is  per 
manent  evil  in  the  world,  and  certain  punishment,  ever. 
Misfortune,  poverty,  vice,  blind  impulse,  it  is  probable  will 
always  exist.  Earth  may  never  again  see  an  Eden  (the  abode 
of  innocence),  till  purged  from  grosser  impurities  by  the  last 
penal  fires.  Out  of  a  world-conflagration  only  may  universal 
peace  and  purity  arise.  Hence,  we  must  conclude,  the  co 
existence  of  crime  and  prisons  for  ages  hereafter. 

The  prison  described  in  this  little  volume,  was  a  debtors' 
prison,  the  King's  Bench.  In  our  State,  imprisonment  for 
debt  is  now  done  away ;  a  measure  fraught  with  vast  benefit, 
but,  perhaps,  accompanied  by  certain  inevitable  disadvan 
tages.  It  is  wonderful  what  enormities  were  suffered  to  be 
executed,  until  within  a  very  few  years,  on  this  class  of  men, 
of  whom,  certainly,  a  considerable  portion  were  innocent 
men,  brought  to  that  condition  by  the  vices,  or  imprudence, 
or  frauds  of  those,  who  stood  in  the  relation  of  debtors  to 
them.  To  this  suffering,  but  respectable  class  of  men,  the 
author  of  this  treatise  (the  fruit  of  personal  observation  arid 
experience)  does  not  appear  to  belong.  From  what  wo  can 
gather,  he  was  brought  by  his  imprudence  and  folly  to  be 
come  an  inhabitant  of  a  prison.*  He  was  a  gentleman  of 

*  A  strong  proof  of  family  pride,  rather  misplaced,  is  evinced 
in  the  fact  of  the  writer  having  his  crest  engraved  on  the  title 
page.  The  experience  the  book  displays  is  hardly  of  that  nature  a 
gentleman  might  be  proud  to  display,  even  if  enamored  of  his  own 
cleverness  as  an  author. 


244  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

good  family  and  liberal  education,  who  was  heartily  disgusted 
by  the  place,  its  customs  and  company ;  and  who  earnestly 
advises  all  not  to  borrow,  and  run  the  chance  of  coming  to 
the  same  place.  He  writes  with  the  vigor  of  a  strong  charac 
ter,  and  with  no  little  elevation  of  sentiment ;  he  is  judicious 
and  virtuous,  with  considerable  erudition  and  quaint  fancy, 
bottomed  on  good  sense  and  manly  feeling. 

The  composition  of  these  essays  and  characters  afforded 
the  only  occupation  their  author  was  willing  to  assume ;  and 
was  at  once  his  pleasant  task  and  daily  solace.  The  work  is 
of  some  antiquity;  it  was  first  published  in  1618,  and  re 
printed  twenty  years  after.  The  edition  before  us  is  of  1821, 
a  reprint  by  the  famous  Edinburgh  publishing  house  of 
Ballantyne  &  Co.  It  is  one  of  a  small  edition  of  150  copies, 
and  perhaps  there  is  not  a  duplicate  of  the  work  in  this 
country.  We  think  it  very  probable  that  Sir  Walter  him 
self,  or  one  of  his  antiquarian  cronies,  selected  this  remark 
able  tract  for  republication,  and  with  the  selfish  admiration 
of  a  virtuoso,  limited  the  impression  to  enhance  its  rarity. 

We  spoke  of  this  volume  as  presenting  a  picture  of  life 
in  prison  :  it  presents,  also,  its  concomitants.  The  first 
character  is  of  prisons  in  general ;  then  of  different  sorts  of 
prisoners  ;  afterwards,  in  turn,  of  the  company :  of  visitors  : 
of  the  fare  and  entertainment :  of  the  keepers,  the  jailors,  the 
lockers  up ;  and  concludes  \vith  a  relation  of  some  curious 
local  customs  and  personal  observations. 

The  intention  of  the  writer  is  expressed  in  a  sort  of  proem 
to  the  characters.  "  My  purpose  is,  with  cleare  water-colours 
to  line  me  out  a  heart,  yea  auch  a  heart,  so  discontented  and 
oppressed,  that  I  need  not  be  curious  in  fitting  every  colour 
to  his  place,  or  to  chuse  the  pleasantest  chamber  to  draw  it 
in,  because  in  it  I  am  to  lay  downe  the  bounds  of  those  tern- 


MINBHULL'S  PRISON  AND  PRISONERS.  245 

pestuous  seas  in  which  ten  thousands  are  every  day  tossed, 
if  not  overwhelmed,  which  is  so  usual  here  amongst  us,  that 
every  one  is  art's  master  in  this  workmanship ;  and  every 
minute  something  or  other  is  still  added  to  this  distressed 
picture,  whose  ponderous  weight  is  so  great  that  the  frame  is 
scarce  able  to  bear  the  effigies."  The  character  of  a  prison 
we  subjoin  entire.  "  A  prison  is  a  grave  to  bury  men  alive, 
and  a  place  wherein  a  man,  for  half  a  year's  experience,  may 
learn  more  law,  than  he  can  at  Westminster  for  a  hundred 
pounds.  It  is  a  microcosrao,  a  little  world  of  woe,  it  is  a 
map  of  misery,  it  is  a  place  that  will  learn  a  young  man 
more  villany,  if  he  be  apt  to  take  it,  in  one  half  yeare,  than 
he  can  learn  at  twenty  dicing-houses,  bowling  allies,  brothel 
houses,  or  ordinaries ;  and  an  old  man,  more  policie  than  if 
he  had  been  pupil  to  Machiavel.  It  is  a  place  that  hath 
more  diseases  predominant  in  it  than  the  pest-house  in  the 
plague  time,  and  it  stinkes  more  than  the  lord  mayor's  dog 
house  or  Paris  garden  in  August. 

"  It  is  a  little  commonwealth,  although  little  wealth  be 
common  there  ;  it  is  a  desart  where  desert  lyes  hoodwinked  : 
it  is  a  famous  citie,  wherein  are  all  trades,  for  here  lies  the 
alchymist  can  make  ex  auro  non  aurum,  then  ex  non  auro, 
aurum. 

44  It  is  as  intricate  a  place  as  Rosamond's  Labyrinth,  and 
it  is  so  full  of  blinde  meanders  and  crooked  turnings,  that  it 
is  impossible  to  find  the  way  out,  except  he  be  directed  by  a 
silver  clue,  and  can  never  overcome  the  minotaure  without  a 
golden  ball  to  work  hisowne  safety. 

"  It  is  as  Innes  of  Courts  ;  for  herein  lawyers  inhabit,  that 
have  crotchets  to  free  other  men,  yet  all  their  quirks  and 
quiddities  cannot  enfranchise  themselves. 

"It  is  the  Doctors'  Commons,  where  skilful  physitians  fre- 


246  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

quent ;  who,  like  ^Esculapius,  can  cure  men's  diseases,  yet 
cannot  quintessence  out  of  all  their  vegetals  and  minerals,  a 
balsamum  or  elixir  to  make  a  sovereign  plaster  to  heal  the 
surfeit  the  mace  has  given  them. 

"  It  is  the  Chyrurgions'  Hall,  where  many  rare  artists  live, 
that  can  search  other  men's  wounds,  yet  cannot  treate  the 
wound  the  serjeant  hath  give  them. 

"  It  is  your  Bankrupt's  banquetting-house,  where  he  sits 
feasting  with  the  sweetmeats  borrowed  from  other  men's 
tables,  having  a  voluntary  disposition  never  to  repay  them 
again. 

"It  is  your  Prodigal's  ultimum  refugium,  wherein  he  may 
see  himself  as  in  a  glass,  what  his  excess  hath  brought  him 
to ;  and  lest  he  should  surfeit,  comes  hither  to  physicke  him 
self  with  moderate  diet,  and  least  that  his  bed  of  downe 
should  breed  too  many  diseases,  comes  hither  to  change  his 
bed,  where  he  is  scarce  able  to  lye  down. 

"  It  is  a  purgatory  which  doth  afflict  a  man  with  more 
miseries  than  ever  he  reaped  pleasures.  It  is  a  pilgrimage 
to  exterminate  sins  and  absolve  offences  ;  for  here  be  semin 
aries  and  masse  priests,  which  doe  take  down  the  pride  of 
their  flesh  more  than  a  voyage  to  the  Holy  Land  or  a  hair 
shirt  in  Lent. 

"  It  is  an  evil  which  doth  banish  a  man  from  all  content 
ments,  wherein  his  actions  do  so  terrifie  him,  that  it  makes  a 
man  grow  desperate. 

"  To  conclude,  what  is  it  not  ?  In  a  word,  it  is  the  very 
idea  of  all  misery  and  torment ;  it  converts  joy  into  sorrow, 
riches  into  poverty,  and  ease  into  discontentments." 

Minshull  expends  the  whole  force  of  his  satire  on  inhuman 
creditors.  His  pen  on  this  topic  hits  the  true  Juvenal  strain  ; 
yet  he  willingly  excuses  the  creditor,  who  employs  constraint 


MINSHULL'S  PRISON  AND  PRISONERS.  247 

and  the  strong  arm  of  the  law,  to  obtain  his  due,  which  he 
needs  to  prevent  his  coming  hither  himself. 

A  choice  essay  on  '  Choice  of  Company  in  Prison,'  com 
mences  thus :  u  Wouldst  thou  learn  to  dispute  well  ?  Be  an 
excellent  sophister.  Wouldst  thou  dispute  of  foreign  affairs, 
and  be  an  excellent  linguist?  I  counsel  thee  to  travel. 
Wouldst  thou  be  of  a  pleasing  and  affectionate  behaviour? 
Frequent  the  court.  Wouldst  thou  Jive  into  ike  secret  vil- 
lanies  of  man  ?  Lye  in  prison."  He  divides  all  the  different 
varieties  of  prison  companions  into  three  sorts.  1.  A  para 
site.  2.  A  John  indifferente.  3.  A  true-hearted  Titus  : 
1  the  masculine  sweetheart.'  On  visitors  to  the  prisoners  he 
is  pretty  hard :  ascribing  their  assumed  condolence  to  mere 
curiosity,  lie  is,  perhaps,  unjust  in  his  almost  universal  cen 
sure  ;  though  all  prisoners  are  not  so  fortunate  as  was  Leigh 
Hunt,  who  had  his  wife  and  children,  and  books,  and  flowers, 
and  music,  and  pure  fancies,  and  sweet  thoughts.  This  in 
nocent  prisoner  and  fine  writer  had  a  noble  company  of  visit 
ors  :  some  of  them  daily  companions,  Shelley,  Charles 
Lamb,  Tom  Moore,  Horace  Smith,  Miss  Lamb,  William  Haz- 
litt,  Jeremy  lienthani.  A  delightful  subject  for  an  article, 
for  Hunt  himself  would  be  a  paper  on  the  great  and  good 
men,  who  have  by  any  mischance  become  inmates  of  a  prison  : 
and  of  the  admirable  books  written  there. 

In  one  respect,  Minshull  bears  some  resemblance  to  Cob- 
bet,  i.  e.,  in  taking  awkward  nick-names  on  the  objects  of  his 
aversion.  He  speaks,  by  way  of  irony,  of  his  entertainments 
and  entertainers  in  prison  :  tin-  oiiard  at.  the  gate  is  a  Cerbe 
rus,  of  whom  there  is  a  terrific  print  on  the  title  page:  his 
4  chamber-fellows' are  Threadbare  and  Monilesse  :  the  gar 
dener,  Potherb  j  the  steward,  Cut-throate  ;  the  cook,  Mistress 
Mutton  Chops ;  the  keeper  who  accompanies  the  prisoners 
when  they  walk  without  the  prison,  Argus. 


248  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

Upon  the  jailors  Minshull  expends  all  the  bitterness,  of 
•which  the  humanity  of  his  nature  was  capable.  He  repre 
sents  them  as  devils  rather  than  men,  which,  indeed,  it  is 
the  tendency  of  their  functions  to  make  them. 

The  verses  prefixed  to  the  treatise,  we  think,  comprise  the 
sum  of  the  matter  : 

A  prison  is  a  house  of  care, 

A  place  where  none  can  thrive, 

A  touch-stone  true  to  try  a  friend, 

A  grave  for  one  alive  : 

Sometimes  a  place  of  right, 

Sometimes  a  place  of  wrong, 

Sometimes  a  place  for  rogues  and  thieves. 

And  honest  men  among. 


XXXII 

ON  PREACHING. 

I  never  printed  a  sermon  but  upon  compulsion,  except  one.  There  is  enough 
and  too  much  of  that  sort  of  work.  Better  discourses  on  morality  cannot  be  had 
than  hundreds  the  world  is  in  possession  of. — Abp.  Herring,  Let.  xiy. 

'Tis  good  to  preach  the  same  thing  again  ;  for  that  is  the  way  to  have  it  learned. 
You  see  a  bird  by  often  whistling,  to  learn  a  tune,  and  a  month  after  to  record  it 
to  herself.— Sdden.— Table-Talk. 

WHEN  we  consider  the  frequency  of  the  occasion,  the  noble 
ness  of  the  topics,  their  supreme  importance,  the  efficacy  of 
the  act  well  performed,  the  genius  requisite,  the  variety  of 
congregations,  the  number  of  preachers,  we  are  at  a  complete 
stand  to  account  for  the  deplorably  low  state  of  preaching. 


ON    PREACHING.  249 

This  confession,  extorted  from  us  by  the  facts  of  the  case, 
may  afford  matter  of  astonishment  to  many  who  are  very  well 
satisfied  with  the  present  state  of  the  pulpit — who  ask  for 
nothing  better — who  perhaps  could  not  comprehend  anything 
superior.  We  have  always  been  well  pleased  at  the  recol 
lection  of  that  passage  in  the  Spectator,  where  Sir  Roger  de 
Coverly's  parish  clergyman  being  asked  who  was  to  preach 
on  the  next  Sunday  for  him,  replied,  "  The  Bishop  of  St. 
Asaph  in  the  morning,  and  Doctor  South  in  the  aftemoon"- 
meaniug  that  he  intended  reading  a  sermon  from  those  great 
divines  on  both  occasions.  We  heartily  wish  some  of  the 
divines  of  this  day  would  have  the  courage,  as  well  as  the 
good  sense,  to  adopt  a  similar  practice  at  suitable  opportuni 
ties.  In  point  of  essential  merit,  no  critic,  any  way  qualified, 
would  hesitate  to  gife  the  preference  to  one  of  South's  best 
sermons  over  a  majority  of  modern  discourses  even  by  di 
vines  of  considerable  eminence.  What  pithiness  of  sense 
and  point  of  expression  in  the  old  divines !  What  weak 
ness,  flaccidity,  baldness,  in  the  present  race !  If  the  exces 
sive  length  of  Barrow,  or  the  local  satire  of  South,  or  the  ex 
travagant  erudition  and  overflowing  fancy  of  Taylor,  be  ex- 
cepted  to,  let  Barrow  be  condensed,  expurgate  South,  and 
prune  the  excrescences  of  the  Bishop  of  Down  and  Connor. 
Taste,  no  mean  talents,  judgment,  are  requisite  for  the  selec 
tion  and  purgation,  and  only  to  the  hands  of  a  first-rate  man 
would  we  consign  the  task.  Inferior  intellects,  if  admitted, 
on  the  plea  of  piety,  into  the  Church  at  all,  should  not  pre 
tend  to  this,  but  take  the  best  sermons  as  they  find  them.  It 
is  not  for  them  to  abuse  and  dislocate  the  fine  thoughts  of 
genius,  which  learning  may  have  overloaded,  or  temporary 
allusions  render  faint  and  obscure.  It  is  almost  presumption 
in  a  man  of  e^ua!  genius,  to  try  his  skill  on  the  same  subjects 
11* 


250  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

that  have  engaged  the  attention  of  those  master  intellects  ; 
for  Cowley  to  attempt  a  flight  with  the  Theban  eagle.  It  is 
absolute  profanation  for  a  petty  parson  to  endeavor  to  hurl 
the  thunders  of  avenging  justice,  or  to  imitate  the  silver  elo 
quence  of  an  Angel  of  Mercy. 

From  the  practice  of  reading  the  best  published  sermons 
of  standard  and  orthodox  divines,  two  good  results,  if  no 
more,  would  follow ;  the  art  of  elocution  would  be  much 
more  attended  to,  and  the  sermons  could  be  studied  and 
carefully  meditated,  by  which  means  the  preacher  might  de 
liver  them  with  greater  effect.  We  suspect  that  many  a 
minister  would  then  understand  his  theme  better  than  now, 
that  he  is  obliged  to  write  so  frequently  and  at  such  com 
paratively  short  notice. 

To  this  practice  the  majority  of  congregations  might 
demur,  so  strong  is  the  hold  of  ancient  usage  upon  men's 
minds.  The  curse  of  political  seems  to  be  the  predominant 
vice  of  religious  corporations,  viz. :  a  blindness  to  innova 
tion — even  when  wholesome  reform ;  a  prejudice  in  favor 
of  existing  practices.  Many  good  people  appear  to  suspect 
indolence  or  indifference  on  the  part  of  a  preacher  who  reads 
a  printed  sermon.  They  call  it  an  imposition.  They  must 
have  a  return  for  the  salary.  But  is  a  meagre  discourse 
from  your  parson  as  well  worth  your  attention  as  a  sermon 
from  the  lips  of  the  English  Chrysostoms  and  Austins  ?  As 
it  is,  are  they  all  original  preachers  who  deliver  written  ser 
mons  ?  A  sermon  may  be  transferred  as  well  as  anything 
else.  There  are  other  "conveyances"  besides  those  of  a 
legal  description.  The  very  critics,  who  speak  so  authori 
tatively,  are  not  always  acquainted  with  the  sources  of  the 
finest  thoughts  and  most  sparkling  fancies.  When  they 
abuse  the  preacher's  tediousness,  they  may  be  reflecting 


ON    PREACHING.  251 

upon  Tillotson ;  and  when  pleased  with  a  graceful  expression, 
they  may  be  only  assenting  to  the  sentiment  of  Sherlock  or 
Atterbury. 

In  no  department  of  literature  perhaps  (considered  as 
such)  is  a  greater  decline  more  manifestly  evident  than  in 
the  eloquence  of  the  pulpit.  Most  of  the  current  spoken 
eloquence  is  confessedly  very  vapid,  and  even  tiresome, 
when  transferred  to  paper.  Sergeant  Talfourd,  a  man  of 
elegant  poetic  talent,  and  a  popular  debater,  a  very  con 
siderable  portion  of  whose  enviable  reputation  is  derived 
from  his  efforts  at  the  bar  and  in  the  House,  acknowledges 
the  fact  in  explicit  terms  in  his  memoirs  of  Charles  Lamb. 
This  declaration,  from  the  pen  of  the  author  of  Ion,  should 
certainly  weigh  as  powerful  evidence  with  those  who  con 
sider  the  transitory  impressions  a  practical  and  fluent 
speaker  can  create  as  incomparably  superior  to  the  elabo 
rate  thought  and  rich  fancy  of  the  studious  author.  There 
are  popular  speakers,  both  in  the  pulpit  and  in  the  Senate, 
whose  oratorical  art  enables  them  to  control  or  excite  the 
passions  at  will,  who  yet  prudently  abstain  from  publica 
tion,  and  thus  tacitly  confess  the  decay  of  the  literature  of 
eloquence  and  their  inferiority  as  writers.  It  is  no  disgrace 
for  a  man  to  be  inferior  in  one  department,  merely  because 
he  is  excellent  in  another.  Speaking  and  writing  are  sepa 
rate  arts,  and  the  distinct  merits  of  each  are  only  confounded 
by  those  who  cannot  discriminate,  but  know  only  how  to 
extol  or  condemn.  The  nice  shades  of  difference,  which  con 
stitute  this  (so  real)  distinction,  are  perfectly  perceptible  and 
unquestionably  true.  We  are  acquainted  with,  and  have 
listened  to,  brilliant  speakers  whose  written  compositions  are 
below  mediocrity,  or,  at  best,  only  on  a  par  with  it.  But 
this  should  not  oblige  us  to  deny  the  palpable  fact  of  the 


252  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

great  scarcity  of  good,  not  to  say  excellent,  sermons  published 
now-a-days. 

A  defect  of  literary  accomplishment,  then,  among  the 
body  of  the  clergy,  may  be  taken  as  the  cause  of  the  infe 
riority  of  modern  sermons ;  style  and  manner  are  not 
sufficiently  attended  to.  Art  is  neglected,  and  yet  pulpit 
eloquence  is  an  art,  as  much  so  as  political,  and  a  higher 
art,  at  the  same  time.  Natural  eloquence  is  not  enough 
by  itself;  it  must  be  trimmed  and  trained  by  scholarship, 
research,  elegance  and  breeding.  To  the  sacred  charac 
ter  of  Divine  must  be  appended  the  no  less  valuable, 
though  less  sacred  characters  of  scholar,  critic,  orator,  and 
gentleman.  Arrayed  in  such  vestments,  the  clerical  cha 
racter  shines  the  leading  order.  Deprived  of  these  acces 
sory  qualities  and  ornaments,  it  is  likely  to  be  abused  and 
degraded. 

The  clergy  and  religious  critics  of  certain  denomina 
tions  appear  to  think  just  the  reverse  of  this  to  be  the  cor 
rect  view.  Learning  and  eloquence,  they  seem  to  hold  in 
puritanical  abhorrence,  and  to  consider  the  cause  of  religion 
disgraced  by  the  splendid  displays  of  human  genius.  They 
oppose  taste  to  piety,  and  an  evangelical  spirit,  to  an  inven 
tive  imagination  ;  as  if  for  a  moment,  a  man  of  sense  could 
conceive  any  preference,  or  even  hint  at  a  comparison  ;  such 
parallels  are  offensive,  both  to  religion  and  criticism.  Nar 
row  bigots  !  ought  they  not  rather  to  regard  the  highest 
efforts  of  intellectual  power  as  the  truest  adoration  of  the 
Supreme  Being  ?  To  honor  or  glorify  that  sacred  name, — 
is  it  not  the  loftiest  occupation  of  humanity  ?  A  hymn  to 
His  praise,  the  sublimest  strain  of  poesy  ?  insomuch  that  a 
man  can  evince  no  higher  ambition  than  that  of  the  great 
preacher. 


ON    PREACHING.  258 

The  perfect  pulpit-orator  should  be  a  saint  and  an  orator 
united  ;  a  Paul,  an  Augustine,  a  Jeremy  Taylor.  No  years 
of  study,  no  libraries,  no  studious  pursuits  are  wasted  on  him 
whose  office  it  is  to  minister  at  the  altar.  His  is  the  highest 
of  all  duties — that  of  Adoration  and  Prayer :  to  perform  these 
duties  with  dignity,  ignorance  is  by  no  means  the  most  fitting 
preparative. 

A  consequence  of  this  vitiated  style  of  composition  is  seen 
in  the  vitiated  taste  of  audiences.  They  take  their  standard 
from  contemporary  preaching  (few  scholars  constituting 
modern  congregations),  and  that  standard  is,  too  often,  a  low 
one. 

The  spirit  of  the  age,  also,  hostile  to  fanciful  illustration,  or 
refined  speculation  in  sacred  discourses,  and  rather  looking  to 
utilitarian  logic,  has,  we  are  apt  to  imagine,  cast  a  chilling 
influence  over  the  imagination,  and  rendered  the  warm  and 
glowing  appeals  tame  and  cold. 

Be  the  causes  what  they  may,  however,  the  fact  remains, 
of  a  very  certain  declension  in  the  eloquence  of  the  chair  (as 
the  French  term  Pulpit  Oratory),  since  the  days  of  the  old 
divines.  Whether  they  were  a  privileged  race  of  men,  had 
stronger  thoughts,  and  more  capacious  heads,  or  more  affec 
tionate  and  philanthropic  hearts,  we  will  not  attempt  to  de 
termine.  That  they  were  far  better  scholars  than  the  present 
race,  is  confessed  ;  that  they  had  more  poetry  in  them,  is 
granted — and  it  is  also  admitted,  that  their  poetry  did  their 
piety  no  material  injury  ;  nay,  that  it  heightened  and  refined  it. 
The  old  English  Divines  form  a  choice  department  in  a  library 
of  old  English  literature.  It  has  been  said  that  a  complete 
library  could  be  formed  from  their  works  alone,  and  that,  too, 
a  most  valuable  collection.  For  though  Divines,  they  were 
none  the  less  wits,  historians,  scholars,  and  moralists.  In  this 


254  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

respect  they  differ  from  the  French  pulpit  orators,  who  were 
either  mere  declaimers  or  else  scholastic  controversialists. 
The  English  Divines  wrote  not  merely  sermons  and  works  of 
scholastic  divinity — but  they  wrote  books  of  moral  essays, 
characters,  satires ;  works  on  life  and  manners.  They  had 
wit  and  humor  as  well  as  fancy  and  sentiment.  They  were 
not  merely  the  spiritual  guides,  but  also  the  popular  writers 
of  the  day.  They  had  large  capacity  of  reason  and  richness 
of  imagination.  They  were  picturesque,  pointed,  practical. 
Not  merely  fine  writers,  they  were  deep  thinkers  and  acute 
observers.  There  is  a  substance  and  solidity  in  every  one  of 
them  that  would  furnish  out  a  score  of  modern  writers  with 
brains.  Barrow  alone  would  cut  up  into  a  dozen  fashionable 
lecturers,  and  Taylor  might  serve  as  a  resouree  for  the  poets 
of  at  least  one  generation.  Hall  and  Donne,  as  satirists, 
might  send  Gifford  and  Byron  to  school  to  learn  their  art  ; 
and  Earle  is  at  least  as  knowing  as  William  Cobbett. 

In  their  books  we  find  not  only  the  noblest  doctrines  of  a 
true  Christian  morality,  heightened  by  pure  religion,  but  we 
also  discover  profound  speculations  on  human  nature,  and  a 
truer  insight  into  the  characters  of  men.  We  have  there 
preserved  for  us  the  truest  pictures  of  that  time,  and  the 
ruling  tendencies  of  that  age. 

They  were  thus  not  only  scholars  and  preachers,  but  also 
men  of  the  world  (in  a  good  senso),  and  men  of  reflection. 

As  writers,  and  chiefly  as  writers  of  sermons,  we  shall  con 
sider  them,  leaving  controversy  and  their  individual  tenets 
out  of  the  question.  The  moot  points  of  that  day,  and  indeed 
of  every  age,  interest  but  very  few ;  but  the  wholesome  doc 
trines  and  high  principles  these  writings  contain,  are  good  at 
and  in  all  times.  They  have  good  thoughts  for  our  times, 
and  noble  thoughts  for  the  best  seasons.  To  the  student, 


ON    PREACHING.  255 

their  works  are  full  of  thought  and  learning ;  to  the  specula- 
tist,  they  are  full  of  high  aims  and  generous  aspirations ;  to 
to  the  afflicted,  they  contain  the  surest  consolation,  next  to 
the  Scriptures  themselves. 

We  beg  leave  to  premise,  on  the  very  threshold  of  these 
criticisms,  that  we  write  not  for  the  professional  reader, 
who,  doubtless,  is  at  least  equally  well,  if  not  (as  he 
should  be)  much  better  acquainted  than  we  can  be  with  these 
old  writers  ;  but  for  the  general  inquirer,  who  may  be  easily 
repelled  in  his  researches,  by  unfortunately  stumbling  on  the 
worst  scribblers  of  that  time.  At  that  time,  as  now,  there 
were  a  large  class  of  writers,  crude  thinkers;  and  such  are 
ever  in  the  majority.  Old  English  literature  may  be  com 
pared  to  the  book-closet  in  an  old-fashioned  country  house, 
which  contains  a  vast  variety  of  learned  lumber  and  useless 
trash  ;  still,  here  and  there  a  rare  volume ;  an  old  manuscript 
of  great  value ;  a  set  of  books,  entirely  preserved,  of  some 
fruitful  and  popular  writer  years  ago.  These  have  all  been 
tumbled  in  together  in  one  medley.  Even  in  many  other 
wise  worthless  books  he  will  find  a  brilliant  page  or  two,  or 
a  curious  chapter,  or  erudite  notes,  or  a  fantastic  appendix. 
The  very  titles  and  mottoes  of  some  these  curious  treatises 
cannot  foil  to  breed  some  speculation  ;  the  prefaces  and  dedi 
cations  form  materials  for  a  literary  history  of  the  time. 

If  the  student  has  never  happened  upon  these  writers  be 
fore,  he  will  be  surprised  to  find  a  manly  vigor  of  thought 
and  independence  of  expression  in  them,  of  which  very  few 
examples  remain  at  the  present  day. 

It  is  to  be  wondered  at  the  ignorance  on  this  subject.  Most 
readers  regard  all  that  is  old  as  trite,  and  speak  of  the  great 
body  of  English  divines  as  dull  and  tiresome. 

A  point  not  sufficiently  regarded  is  the  admirable  morality 


256  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

of  these  divines ;  not  only  the  Christian  morality  (the  high 
est)  of  their  writings,  but  also  the  wide  and  liberal  range  of 
their  sympathies  as  men.  They  not  only  taught  as  Christian 
ministers,  but  also  felt  as  men  and  for  their  fellow-creatures. 
There  is  more  humanity  in  their  moral  teaching  than  in  any 
of  the  professed  books  on  morality.  They  are  more  truly 
moral  than  the  merely  technical  teachers  of  morality.  Pas 
sages  even  occur  in  their  works  of  a  tendency  to  which  the 
strait-laced  professors  of  later  times  might  object,  as  free  and 
latitudinarian ;  they  are  more  compassionate  than  censorious. 
Do  not  these  objectors  forget,  however,  that  the  severest 
moralist  in  judging  of  himself  may  be,  and,  indeed,  ought  to 
be,  the  most  merciful  in  his  judgment  of  others  ?  The  true 
Christian  is  not  he  who  finds  most  errors  in  other  sects  or 
ndividuals.  Rebuke  is  not  religion,  nor  captiousness  Chris 
tianity.  "Judge  not,  that  ye  be  not  judged,"  is  a  cardinal 
rule  of  Chris  nan  conduct. 

Equally  sound  and  admirable  are  the  old  divines  in  point 
of  Christian  doctrine.  The  squeamish  churchman  need  never 
fear  to  contract  any  taint  of  heresy,  or  run  foul  of  any  dis 
puted  and  doubtful  dogmas  in  their  writings.  As  writers 
and  thinkers,  they  are  above  all  praise.  In  the  language  of 
a  fine  writer,  also  a  judicious  admirer  of  these  old  worthies: 
"  It  is  well  to  moralize  with  Hall,  and  raise  the  fancy  with 
the  imagination  of  Taylor ;  to  raise  the  flame  of  piety  with 
Herbert,  or  to  be  jested  into  seriousness  by  the  points  of 
Fuller." 

The  defects  of  contemporary  preaching  are  two-fold :  lite 
rary  and  religious.  We  must  premise  two  considerations  be 
fore  entering  upon  these  points  of  criticism.  Preaching  is  too 
general  to  have  any  special  efficacy.  It  is  directed  against 
vice  and  sin  in  the  abstract:  it  enforces  virtue  and  goodness 


ON    PREACHING.  257 

in  the  general.  It  recognises  passions  and  sentiments,  rather 
than  a  separate  act  or  an  individual  feeling.  It  wants  par 
ticularity.  The  preacher  addresses  his  congregation,  rather 
than  any  single  member  of  it.  Perhaps  there  is  no  speciality 
in  his  ideas ;  he  may  himself  entertain  only  general  impres 
sions  of  the  beauty  of  holiness  or  the  heinousness  of  crime. 
His  own  soul  may  not  be  truly  alive  to  the  convictions 
of  his  reason ;  his  own  spirit  may  not  be  wholly  imbued 
with  his  own  doctrines.  As  a  matter  of  course,  he  can 
produce  no  impression,  who  feels  no  strong  motives  for  ex 
citing  any. 

Preaching  is  al?o  too  frequent.  It  is  made  too  common. 
In  the  early  history  of  the  Church,  priests,  or  at  least  one 
class  of  them,  were  allowed  to  preach  only  at  stated  times, 
some,  if  we  are  not  mistaken,  not  oftener  than  once  a  month. 
This,  too,  at  a  time  when  preaching,  as  a  means  of  making 
proselytes,  was  much  more  essential  to  the  growth  of  the 
Church  than  at  present. 

The  true  intent  of  preaching,  the  object  of  a  sermon,  it 
seems  to  us,  is  not  comprehended.  We  are  impressed 
with  the  truth,  that  a  preacher  should  teach  rather  than 
declaim  ;  convince  than  speculate ;  persuade  than  exhort,  and 
not  merely  amuse  or  entertain.  His  business  is  to  teach 
men  doctrine  and  duty ;  but,  of  the  two,  duty  rather  than 
doctrine,  as  practice  is  more  important  than  opinion.  He 
must  be  himself  sincere,  if  he  would  gain  influence;  and  of 
his  sincerity,  a  good  life  is  the  only  test.  He  must  speak 
from  experience,  who  would  speak  with  authority.  The 
mere  orator  in  the  pulpit  is  contemptible.  What  audacity 
to  play  off  rhetorical  tricks  before  High  Heaven  for  the  ad 
miration  of  a  gaping  crowd  !  At  the  same  time,  severely 
as  we  repudiate  hollow  display,  even  of  the  finest  genius, 


258  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

we  yet  hold  the  noblest  exercise  of  the  faculties  to  be  the 
worship  and  adoration  of  the  Almighty  Father.  To  his 
service  should  the  richest  genius  the  costliest  research, 
the  most  accomplished  talents,  be  dedicated  ;  yet  with  hu 
mility,  and  all  in  his  honor. 

The  pulpit  should  be  the  school,  the  lecture-room,  the 
press  for  the  people.  How  many  glean  all  their  scanty  stock 
from  the  preacher !  Many  take  all  their  religious  and  moral 
views  from  their  clergyman.  This  alone  should  incline  us 
to  fix  the  standard  of  preaching  high,  to  make  it  very  com 
prehensive. 

Of  all  the  varieties  of  preaching,  we  place  the  moral  dis 
course  at  the  head ;  that  which  impresses  our  highest  duties 
and  directs  our  familiar  offices ;  that  which  regards  man  as 
a  social  creature,  as  well  as  a  spiritual  being ;  that  which,  in 
its  zeal  for  heavenly  things  does  not  overlook  the  period 
spent  here  on  this  bank  and  shoal  of  time  !  Such  preaching 
is  Christian,  for  it  is  after  the  model  of  the  Sermon  on  the 
Mount — that  compend  of  Christian  duties.  Much  idle  cant 
has  been  expended  on  a  distinction  between  evangelical  and 
moral  sermons;  as  if  a  good  moralist  was  not,  from  the 
philosophical  nature  of  the  case,  religious.  Not  that  mo 
rality  is  better  than  religion.  It  is  as  good.  It  is  the  same 
with  it.  It  is  Christianity  applied  to  action.  Christianity  is, 
in  a  word,  a  divine  morality.  The  law  of  God  and  the  moral 
law  coincide,  are  contemporary.  Morality  is  not  only  as  old 
as  the  creation,  but  existed  long  before  it — before  all  time — 
in  the  bosom  of  the  Supreme  Being.  An  awful  sense  of  duty 
governs  all  beneath  the  Creator  of  the  world  down  to  the 
meanest  of  his  intelligent  and  responsible  creatures.  This  we 
would  have  preached.  The  most  sterling  of  the  old  divines 
afford  abundant  precedents.  The  sermons  of  Barrow  in  par- 


ON    PREACHING.  '259 

ticular  are  almost  entirely  moral  treatises.  Tillotson  founds 
revelation  on  the  law  of  nature ;  and  speaks  of  the  latter  as 
antecedent  to  the  former. 

Evangelical  piety,  often  pure  and  sincere,  has  as  often  been 
assumed  by  those  who,  disregarding  the  common  rules  of 
morality,  expect  from  their  very  wickedness  to  shine  out  as 
brilliant  lights ; — "  the  greater  sinner,  the  greater  saint."  Is 
it  harsh  to  suspect  such  repentance  half  the  time  ?  About 
strict  morality,  there  can  be  less  mistake.  It  affords  ground 
for  fewer  deceptions. 

There  is  another  vulgar  (though  time-honored)  error 
regarding  the  personal  character  of  the  priest,  which  would 
teach  us  a  bad  man  may  still  be  a  good  priest;  that  the 
office  sanctifies  the  clerical  acts  of  the  incumbent.  This 
cannot  be  so.  It  is  too  revolting  to  common  reason,  let  the 
sophisms  of  controversialists  be  marshalled  as  they  may. 
For  our  own  part  (and  wo  think  we  share  the  feeling  with 
many)  we  cannot  hear  the  sermon  of  a  preacher,  let  him  be 
ever  so  eloquent  or  acute,  if  we  do  not  reverence  his  personal 
character.  The  two  are  inseparable — and  of  the  two,  the 
man  should  predominate.  When  the  man  is  good  and  the 
priest  is  perfect  in  his  function,  then  we  find  the  true  charac 
ter.  The  formalist  and  the  hypocrite  sometimes  usurp  his 
place,  and  in  passing  we  will  glance  at  each.  The  formalist 
in  the  pulpit  is  as  injurious  to  the  cause  of  religion  as  the 
sceptic  in  company  ;  perhaps  more  hurtful,  because  with  less 
art,  and  without  an  avowed  design.  The  one  disgusts  the 
man  of  sense  and  sincere  Christian ;  the  other,  by  specious 
logic,  alarms  the  wary  and  puts  his  opponents  on  their  guard. 
We  find  a  passage  in  Mr.  Emerson's  Divinity  Address  so 
germane  to  the  matter,  that  we  cannot  forbear  quoting  it : — 

"  Whenever  the  pulpit  is  usurped  by  a  formalist,  then  is 


260  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

the  worshipper  defrauded  and  disconsolate.  We  shrink  as 
soon  as  the  prayers  begin,  which  do  not  uplift,  but  smite  and 
offend  us.  We  are  fain  to  wrap  our  cloak  about  us,  and 
secure  as  best  we  can,  a  solitude  that  hears  not.  I  once 
heard  a  preacher  who  sorely  tempted  me  to  say,  I  would  go 
to  church  no  more.  Men  go,  thought  I,  where  they  are  wont 
to  go,  else  had  no  soul  entered  the  temple  in  the  afternoon. 
A  snow-storm  was  falling  around  us.  The  snow-storm  was 
real,  the  preacher  merely  spectral ;  and  the  eye  felt  the  sad 
contrast  in  looking  at  him,  and  then  out  of  the  window 
behind  him  into  the  beautiful  meteor  of  the  snow.  He  had 
lived  in  vain.  He  had  not  one  word  intimating  that  he  had 
laughed  or  wept,  was  married  or  in  love,  had  been  com 
mended,  or  cheated,  or  chagrined.  If  he  had  ever  lived  and 
acted,  we  were  none  the  wiser  for  it.  The  capital  secret  of 
his  profession,  namely,  to  convert  life  into  truth,  he  had  not 
learned.  Not  one  fact  in  all  his  experience  had  he  yet 
imported  into  his  doctrine.  This  man  had  ploughed  and 
planted,  and  talked,  and  bought,  and  sold;  he  had  read 
books ;  he  had  eaten  and  drunken  ;  his  head  aches ;  his 
heart  throbs;  he  smiles  and  suffers;  yet  there  was  not  a 
surmise,  a  hint  in  all  the  discourse  that  he  had  ever  lived  at 
all.  Not  a  line  did  he  draw  out  of  real  history.  The  true 
preacher  can  always  be  known  by  this,  that  he  deals  out  to 
the  people  his  life, — life  passed  through  the  fire  of  thought. 
But  of  the  bad  preacher,  it  could  not  be  told  from  his  sermon, 
what  age  of  the  world  he  fell  in ;  whether  he  had  a  father  or 
a  child ;  whether  he  was  a  freeholder  or  a  pauper ;  whether 
he  was  a  citizen  or  a  countryman,  or  any  other  fact  of  his 
biography." 

The  hypocrite  is  much  worse,  and,  next  to  the  man  of  cold, 
malicious  heart,  the  worst  man  in  the  world.     Cant,  always 


ON    PREACHING.  261 

despicable,  in  the  pulpit  is  blasphemy.  Yet  there  ia  a  cant 
(if  we  are  not  wrong)  without  hypocrisy  ;  a  professional  style 
of  speech,  an  assumption  of  using  common  words  in  a  par 
ticular  and  pedantic  sense.  Such  is  the  phrase,  "professing" 
Christian,  a  puritanical  expression,  that  has  become  quite 
common ;  a  presumptuous  term,  vain-glorious,  pharisaical. 
The  character  of  the  good  parson  is  far  removed  from  either 
of  these. 

From  two  masterly  essays  (a  little  too  formally  cut, 
perhaps,  for  the  present  day) ;  the  one  by  an  old  English 
master,  Owen  Felltham,  and  the  other,  the  production  of 
the  prince  of  French  moralists,  Labruyere,  we  select  a  few 
passages  equally  striking  and  true.  Owen  Felltham,  in  his 
admirable  Resolves,  in  an  essay  on  Preaching  [he  was  a  sort 
of  amateur  divine  himself,  and  lived  in  an  age  of  the  very 
finest,  and  also  of  the  most  indifferent  pulpit  eloquence, 
according  as  you  study  the  works  of  the  very  first  divines, 
or  the  merely  statistical  or  chronological  discourses  of  mere 
"  enumerators,"  as  Labruyere  himself  calls  the  most  tedious 
class  of  exhorters],  has  these  just  thoughts  thus  curtly  and  a 
little  pedantically  set  forth  : 

"  The  excess  which  is  in  the  defect  of  preaching,  has  made 
the  pulpit  slighted ;  I  mean  the  much  bad  oratory  we  find  it 
guilty  of.  It  is  a  wonder  to  me  how  men  can  preach  so  little 
and  so  long,  so  long  at  a  time  and  so  little  matter ;  as  if  they 
thought  to  please  by  the  inculcation  of  their  vain  tautologies. 
I  see  no  reason  that  so  high  a  Princess  as  Divinity  is,  should 
be  presented  to  the  people  in  the  sordid  rags  of  the  tongue ; 
nor  that  he,  which  speaks  from  the  Father  of  languages, 
should  deliver  his  embassage  in  an  ill  one.  A  man  can 
never  speak  too  well,  where  he  speaks  not  too  obscure. 
Long  and  distended  clauses  are  both  tedious  to  the  ear  and 


262  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

difficult  for  their  retaining.  A  sentence  well  couched  takes 
both  the  sense  and  the  understanding.  I  love  not  those  cart- 
rope  speeches  that  are  longer  than  the  memory  of  man  can 
fathom.  I  see  not  but  that  divinity  put  into  apt  significants, 
might  ravish  as  well  as  poetry. 

"The  weighty  lines  men  find  upon  the  stage,  I  am 
persuaded,  have  been  the  means  to  draw  away  the  pulpit's 
followers.  We  complain  of  drowsiness  at  a  sermon,  when  a 
play  of  doubled  length  leads  us  on  still  with  alacrity.  But 
the  fault  is  not  all  in  ourselves.  If  we  saw  divinity  acted,  the 
gesture  and  variety  would  as  much  invigorate.  But  it  is  too 
high  to  be  personated  by  humanity." 

The  last  sentence  recalls  to  memory  the  pithy  reply  of 
Barren,  the  famous  French  actor,  who,  on  being  asked  why 
the  stage  produced  more  forcible  effects  than  the  pulpit, 
made  answer,  that  they  [the  actors]  represented  things 
feigned  as  if  they  were  real,  whereas  the  divines  treated  the 
most  important  themes  in  such  an  indifferent  manner  as  to 
appear  as  if  they  hardly  credited  their  own  representations. 

"  At  a  sermon  well  dressed,  what  understanding  can  have 
a  motion  to  sleep?  Divinity  well  ordered,  casts  forth  a  bait 
which  angles  the  soul  into  the  ear,  and  how  can  that  close 
when  such  a  guest  sits  in  it  ?  They  are  sermons  but  of  baser 
metals  which  lead  the  eyes  to  slumber.  And  should  we  have 
a  continued  oration,  upon  such  a  subject  as  the  stage  treats 
on,  in  such  words  as  we  hear  some  sermons,  I  am  confident 
it  would  not  only  be  far  more  tedious,  but  nauseous  and  con- 
temptful.  The  most  advantage  they  have  of  other  places  is 
in  their  good  lives  and  actions ;  for  it  is  certain  Cicero  and 
Roscius  are  the  most  complete  when  they  both  make  but 
man."  ****** 

"  I  grieve  that  anything  so  excellent  as  divinity  is,  should 


ON    PREACHING.  LMJ.'f 

fall  into  a  sluggish  handling.  Sure  though  other  inter- 
posures  do  eclipse  her,  yet  this  is  a  principal.  I  never  yet 
knew  a  good  tongue  that  wanted  ears  to  hear  it.  I  will 
honor  her  in  her  plain  trim  ;  but  I  will  wish  to  meet  in  her, 
graceful  jewels,  not  that  they  give  addition  to  her  goodness, 
but  that  she  is  more  persuasive  in  working  on  the  soul  she 
meets  with.  When  I  meet  with  worth  which  I  cannot  over- 
love,  I  can  well  endure  that  art  which  is  a  means  to  heighten 
liking.  Confections  that  are  cordial  are  not  the  worse,  but 
the  better,  for  being  gilded." 

Labruyere,  in  his  admirable  chapter  of  the  Pulpit,  in  his 
famous  book  of  characters  and  manners  of  the  present  age, 
has  exhausted  the  whole  topic,  with  his  habitual  acuteness 
and  profound  judgment.  We  transcribe  some  of  the  most 
striking  passages,  to  show  what  this  keen  observer  and  just 
critic  thought  of  the  matter.  The  truths  he  states  are  of  uni 
versal  application,  as  fresh  now  as  when  they  were  first 
written — more  than  a  century  and  a  half  ago.  The  transla 
tion  is  by  Rowe,  the  dramatist,  and  extremely  well  done.  It 
preserves  the  propriety  of  the  thoughts,  the  nicety  of  the  dis 
tinctions,  and  all  the  point  of  the  original.  It  is,  in  a  word, 
almost  the  best  prose  translation  from  French  into  English, 
that  we  at  present  remember : — 

"Preaching  is  now-a-days  become  a  mere  show  ;  that  evan 
gelic  gravity,  the  life  of  preaching,  is  absolutely  laid  aside  ; 
an  advantageous  mien,  a  pretty  tone  of  voice,  exactness  of 
gesture,  choice  of  expression,  and  long  enumerations,  supply 
its  place.  To  attend  seriously  on  the  Dispensation  of  the  IIolv 
Word  is  no  longercustomary,  going  to  church  is  an  amuse 
ment  among  a  thousand  others,  and  preaching  a  diversion. 
The  preachers  play  for  the  prize,  and  the  hearers  bet  upon 
their  heads.  *  *  *  * 


264  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

"  Profane  eloquence  is  transferred  from  the  bar,  where  it 
formerly  reigned,  to  the  pulpit,  where  it  never  ought  to 
come. 

"  On  the  vain,  unprofitable  sermons  now-a-days ;  the  time 
of  the  Homilies  is  no  more;  the  Basils,  the  Chrysostorns 
could  not  restore  it ;  we  should  fly  into  other  diocesses  to  get 
out  of  the  reach  of  their  voices  and  their  familiar  discourses. 
The  generality  of  men  love  fine  phrases  and  handsome  pe 
riods  ;  admire  what  they  do  not  understand ;  fancy  them 
selves  to  be  informed ;  content  with  deciding  between  the 
first  and  second  doctrine,  or  between  the  last  sermon  or  the 
last  but  one." 

Dr.  Eachard,  in  his  admirable  book  on  the  contempt  of 
the  clergy,  enumerates  most  of  the  vices  of  bad  preaching. 
An  early  Spanish  satirist,  the  author  of  the  history  of  Friar 
Gerund,  has  hit  off  very  spirited  caricatures  of  the  prevalent 
faults  of  the  clergy  of  his  day — Ciceronians,  Jesuits,  and 
others ;  while  Erasmus,  with  his  delicate  irony,  and  good 
Father  Latimer,  with  his  old  English  strength  and  sincerity, 
have  handsomely  satirized  the  lazy  drones,  ignorant  monks, 
and  "  bells  without  clappers,"  "  dumb  dogs,"  &c.,  of  their 
age.  To  give  the  reader  a  fair  taste  of  the  French  wit,  we 
transcribe  the  following  pithy  passages : — 

"  The  Bishop  of  Meaux  and  Father  Bourdaloue  recall 
to  my  mind  Demosthenes  and  Cicero.  Both  of  them  abso 
lute  masters  of  the  eloquence  of  the  pulpit,  have  had  the 
fate  of  other  great  models ;  one  of  them  has  made  a  great 

many  ill  censures,  the  other  a  great  many  ill  imitators." 
*  #  *  * 

"  A  preacher,  methinks,  ought  in  every  one  of  his  sermons, 
to  make  choice  of  one  principal  truth,  whether  it  be  to  move 
terror  or  yield  instruction,  to  handle  that  alone  largely  and 


ON    PREACHING.  265 

fully,  omitting  all  those  foreign  divisions  and  subdivisions 
which  are  so  intricate  and  perplexed.  I  would  not  have  him 
pre-suppose  a  thing  really  false,  which  is,  that  the  great  or 
the  genteel  men  understand  the  religion  they  profess,  and  so 
be  afraid  to  instruct  persons  of  their  wit  and  breeding  in 
their  catechism ;  lot  him  employ  the  long  time  others  are 
composing  a  set,  formal  discourse,  in  making,  that  the  turn 
and  expressions  may,  of  course,  flow  easily  from  him.  Let 
him,  after  necessary  preparation,  yield  himself  up  to  his  own 
genius,  and  to  the  emotions  with  which  a  great  subject  will 
inspire  him  ;  let  him  spare  those  prodigious  efforts  of  memory 
which  look  more  like  reciting  for  a  wager  than  anything 
serious,  and  which  destroy  all  graceful  action  ;  let  him,  on  the 
contrary,  by  a  noble  enthusiasm  dart  conviction  into  the 
soul  and  alarm  the  conscience  ;  let  him,  in  fine,  touch  the 
hearts  of  his  hearers  with  another  fear  than  that  of  seeing 
him  make  some  blunder  or  halt  in  his  sermon. 

"  Let  not  him  who  is  not  yet  arrived  to  such  perfection, 
as  to  forget  himself  in  the  dispensation  of  the  holy  word; 
let  not  him,  I  say,  be  discouraged  by  the  austere  rules 
prescribed  him,  as  if  they  robbed  him  of  the  means  of 
showing  his  genius  and  attaining  the  honors  to  which  he 
aspires.  What  greater  or  more  noble  talent  can  there  be 
than  to  preach  like  an  Apostle,  or  which  deserves  a  bishop- 
rick  better?  Was  Fenelon  unworthy  of  that  dignity  ? 
Was  it  possible  he  should  have  escaped  his  Prince's  choice, 
but  for  another  choice  ?" 

To  descend  from  the  epigram  of  Labruyere  to  plain  prose 
and  critical  commentary.  The  style  of  sermons  cannot  be 
too  plain  and  simple,  in  general.  The  text  should  be  per 
fectly  clear  and  earnest.  Strength  and  seriousness  are  chief 
qualities.  Let  it  be  rather  a  labored  plainness  than  a  labored 
12 


206  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

elegance.  The  greatest  truths,  like  the  richest  gems,  show 
best  plain  set.  The  best  character,  for  a  writer  of  sermons, 
is  Ben  Jonson's  character  of  Cartwright,  the  Dramatist,  who 
was  also  a  preacher.  "  He,  my  son  Cartwright,  writes  all 
like  a  man."  Joined  to  this  manly  sense  let  there  be 
a  liberal  spirit  of  humanity,  a  sympathy  with  men  as 
men ;  compassion  and  fellow-feeling.  Let  suavity  modify 
the  rigor  of  your  doctrines,  and  let  a  Christian  feeling 
overspread  your  whole  spirit.  Thus  we  would  address  the 
preacher. 

Action  and  gesture,  when  natural,  are  always  right — when 
artificial,  very  seldom.  To  the  youthful  student  we  would 
further  say,  the  old  Divines  afford  a  good  school,  but  a 
knowledge  of  human  nature  is  better.  Still,  of  the  old 
Divines  drink  your  fill — of  wisdom,  and  fancy,  and  piety, 
and  acute  knowledge,  and  ability  of  every  kind.  What 
pictures,  and  fair  conceits,  and  rich  harmonies,  in  Taylor! 
what  ingenius  thoughts,  so  fine,  so  delicate,  in  Donne  !  what 
massy  arguments  in  Barrow  and  Sherlock  :  and  he  that  reads 
•the  contemporaries  of  these  old  masters,  will  confess  them  to 
have  written  as  with  a  crisped  pen. 


XXXIII. 


PERHAPS  nowhere  throughout  these  United  States  is  there 
to  be  found  one,  who  unites  so  many  various  characters  as  Dr. 
Francis ;  whether  we  look  upon  him  in  the  light  of  a  highly 

*  Abridged  from  S.  Quart.  Rev.,  June  1861. 


DR.   JOHN    W.    FRANCIS.  267 

scientific  and  skilful  physician;  a  general  polite  scholar;  a 
lover  of  the  whole  family  of  the  arts ;  an  acute  inquirer  into 
every  branch  of  science  ;  an  accurate  and  philosophical  anti 
quary,  yet  fresh  and  lively  in  his  sympathies  with  the  world 
as  it  moves;  a  humane,  kindly,  generous  philanthropist;  a 
converser  full  of  spirit  and  resources,  and  the  general  friend 
of  authors  and  scholars. 

Dr.  John  W.  Francis  is  a  native  of  the  city  of  New  York. 
In  1807,  he  commenced  his  professional  course  of  study  under 
the  late  Dr.  Ilosack,  at  that  period  one  of  the  most  prominent 
physicians  in  New  York,  and  Professor  of  Materia  Medica 
and  Botany  in  Columbia  College.  In  1809,  the  young  me 
dical  student  was  graduated  Bachelor  of  Arts  from  Columbia 
College: — receiving  his  degree  of  M.  D.  in  1811,  from  the 
College  of  Physicians  and  Surgeons;  a  distinct  institution 
which  had  been  established  in  1807.  Of  this  academy  Dr. 
Samuel  Bard  was  the  first  President,  and  Dr.  Francis  the  first 
graduate,  whose  name  is  recorded  in  the  College  Album.  On 
this  score,  and  in  one  sense,  therefore,  Dr.  Francis,  though 
still  in  the  prime  of  life,  with  his  faculties  and  talents  as  vigor 
ous  as  those  of  an  active  and  energetic  man  of  forty,  may  be 
called  the  leader,  and  be  placed  at  the  head  of  the  medical 
body  of  the  city,  if  not  of  the  State,  in  point  of  talents,  skill, 
and  learning. 

From  his  earliest  youth  a  severe  student,  and  blessed  with 
a  constitution  which  admitted  of  it,  he  has  been,  through 
life,  a  hard  worker  in  the  fields  of  acquisition,  and  of  practical 
beneficence. 

Soon  after  he  commenced  the  practice  of  his  profession,  he 
received  a  flattering  proposition  from  Dr.  Ilosack,  his  eminent 
instructor,  to  accept  a  copartnership  with  him  in  his  practice, 
with  which  he  closed.  This  union  lasted  till  1820  ;  since 


268  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

which  time  he  has  been  without  any  partner  in  his  laborious 
duties. 

Nearly  contemporaneous  with  his  partnership,  Dr.  F.  was 
appointed  lecturer  on  the  Institutes  of  Medicine  and  the  Ma- 
teria  Medica.  In  1813,  he  was  appointed  Professor  of  Mate- 
ria  Medica,  at  the  early  age  (for  such  a  post)  of  twenty-three 
years.  With  characteristic  generosity,  he  taught  gratuitously, 
and  delivered  his  first  public  course  of  instruction  to  a  class  of 
one  hundred  and  twenty  students. 

About  this  time,  he  made  his  trip  to  Europe,  for  the  pur 
pose  of  adding  to  his  own  rich  stores,  and  of  bringing  home 
all  the  latest  improvements  in  his  art,  for  the  benefit  of  the 
profession  and  of  society.  He  was  absent  but  a  single  year ; 
but,  during  that  period,  managed  to  see  more,  (which  was 
all  carefully  treasured  up,)  than  most  men  would  in  a  sojourn 
of  thrice  the  length.  He  visited  the  great  hospitals,  and  sat, 
an  attentive  listener,  at  the  lectures  of  the  celebrated  profes 
sors  of  the  day.  With  most  of  these  he  was  intimate,  and 
was  cordially  received  by  such  men  as  Gregory,  Brewster  and 
Brown,  in  Scotland  ;  McCartney  and  Sheridan,  in  Ireland  ; 
Denon,  Cuvier  and  Gall,  in  France.  Abernethy,  amongst  the 
most  distinguished  in  London,  the  sarcastic  wit  and  most  able 
practitioner,  welcomed  him  with  open  arms,  and  offered  him 
a  share  of  his  immense  practice.  What  higher  eulogium 
could  we  present  of  a  young  American  physician ! 

Dr.  Francis  traversed  England,  Ireland,  Scotland,  France 
and  Holland  :  on  returning  home,  he  brought  a  valuable  libra 
ry  with  him,  which  has  been  greatly  augmented  since  in  ex 
tent  and  value. 

In  1817,  Dr.  Francis,  in  connexion  with  his  other  duties, 
filled  the  chair  of  Medical  Jurisprudence;  in  1819,  that  of 
Professor  of  Obstetrics,  in  addition  to  his  former  branch  of 


DR.   JOHN    W.    FRANCIS.  269 

Medical  Jurisprudence.  So  thoroughly  versed  is  this  master 
of  his  profession  in  all  its  branches,  that  he  could  turn  from 
one  department  to  another,  with  the  same  facility  a  clever  sur 
geon  can  perform  a  variety  of  operations.  And,  as  a  sufficient 
proof  of  his  largeness  of  spirit  and  true  generosity  in  this 
single  channel,  we  may  state  that,  for  nearly  twenty  years, 
Dr.  Francis  devoted  from  four  to  six  hours  a-day,  in  instruction 
alone,  at  a  time,  too,  when  he  was  occupied  with  his  private 
and  increasing  practice. 

With  Dr.  Hosack,  Dr.  Francis  edited  the  American  and 
Medical  Register,  and  in  which  he  wrote  a  great  deal  This 
periodical  reached  four  volumes,  and  was  almost  entirely  filled 
with  original  matter.  Dr.  Francis  edited  the  standard  edition 
of  Denman's  Midwifeiy. 

In  conjunction  with  Drs.  Dyckman  and  Beck,  he  edited 
the  New  York  Medical  and  Physical  Journal,  until  the  ter 
mination  of  the  third  volume. 

It  must  be  confessed,  that  our  Doctor  has  done  his  full  share 
towards  paying  that  debt  every  eminent  man  owes  to  his 
profession.  New  York  has  produced  not  only  some  of  the 
ablest  lawyers,  but  she  can  boast  to  have  given  birth  to 
some  of  the  most  admirable  physicians  our  country  can 
display. 

In  his  professional  character  towards  his  brethren  of  the 
faculty,  he  is  liberal,  frank,  cordial ;  free  from  all  jealousies 
and  petty  meanness  ;  a  model  of  conduct  and  courtesy.  In 
charities,  professional  and  pecuniary,  he  is  as  munificent  as  he 
is  unostentatious;  doing  constantly  good  by  stealth,  and 
realizing  the  delightful  picture  drawn  of  Garth  by  his  affec 
tionate  friend,  that  prince  of  gentlemen,  and  elegant  writers, 
Sir  Richard  Steele. 

In  1820,  he  retired  from  these  chairs,  which  he  resigned  at 


270  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

the  same  time,  with  Drs.  Hosack,  Mott,  Mackneven,  Mitchell 
and  Post. 

Since  that  period,  Dr.  Francis  has  been  one  of  the  busiest 
of  practitioners — one  of  the  most  arduous  among  professional 
and  general  students — an  indefatigable  writer  of  the  first  class, 
on  all  the  various  subjects  that  have  come  under  his  pen,  and 
prominently  engaged  in  all  the  literary,  artistic  and  social  in 
stitutions  of  New  York  city.  A  lover  of  society  and  conver 
sation,  he  is  no  less  a  cordial  host  than  an  engaging  compa 
nion.  His  house  is  the  resort  of  artists  and  authors,  of  travel 
lers  and  divines,  and,  indeed,  of  all  clever  and  agreeable  peo 
ple,  who  can  contribute  aught  to  good  conversation,  or  under 
stand  the  art  of  listening. 

For  authors  and  literary  men,  the  Doctor  has  always 
cherished  a  fondness,  arising  from  sympathy  and  mutual  ad 
miration.  Extensively  and  minutely  read  in  polite  literature, 
with  a  memory  most  tenacious,  and  yet  most  ready — an  un 
erring  judgment  and  generous  feeling,  for  every  kind  of  ex 
cellence — he  is  a  true  lover  of  literature,  without  cant  or  pre 
tence. 

He  is  equally  fond  of  art  and  artists — an  enthusiast  in 
music,  painting  and  the  drama.  His  portrait  has  been  painted 
by  at  least  eight  or  ten  of  the  first  artists,  from  Leslie,  in  Lon 
don,  to  Elliott,  perhaps  the  most  spirited  American  portrait 
painter  of  the  present  day.  A  miniature  by  Wenzler,  is 
thought  to  convey  the  most  faithful  resemblance.  The  por 
trait  by  Elliott,  was  done  for  the  Art-Union,  at  their  request, 
of  which  institution  Dr.  Francis  was  the  first  President,  and 
with  Herring,  the  original  projector. 

Music,  in  all  its  forms,  from  the  simplicity  of  the  old  bal 
lads,  to  the  rich  musical  art  of  the  opera,  finds  a  hearty  ad 
mirer  in  the  Doctor. 


DR.   JOHN    W.    FRANCIS.  271 

Of  the  stage,  in  its  best  days,  he  was  a  great  admirer  and 
nice  judge.  From  Cooko  to  Macready,  he  has  had  all  thf 
great  actors  for  his  patients  and  friends.  Kean  is  his  idol  of 
these,  the  truest  tragic  genius  since  Garrick. 

Ills  anecdotes  of  these  eminent  performers,  elicit  the  atten 
tion  of  the  most  indifferent,  and  in  the  Old  Knickerbocker 
Magazine,  of  New  York,  we  have  a  rich  display  of  facts 
touching  the  career  of  both  Cooko  and  Kean.  His  epitaph 
on  Cooke's  monument,  in  St.  Paul's  Church  Yard,  is  widely 
known  and  appreciated. 

Three  kingdoms  claim  his  birth  ; 
Both  hemispheres  pronounce  his  worth. 

Celebrities,  domestic  and  foreign,  he  cherishes  with  pecu 
liar  fondness;  and  modest  merit,  that  blossoms  into  very  mo 
derate  public  uccess,  finds  a  kind  and  ready  friend  in  him. 
He  is  a  member  of  the  Ethnological  Society ;  for  years  was 
one  of  the  most  prominent  leaders  of  the  New  York  Histori 
cal  Society,  which  he  contributed  greatly  to  establish,  and 
which  is  indebted  to  him  for  many  valuable  gifts  and  great 
pecuniary  support.  We  believe,  from  its  formation,  he  was 
the  chief  physician  of  the  St.  Nicholas  Society,  whose  annual 
dinner  he  enlivens  with  his  witty  budget. 

Such  books  as  Watson's  Annals,  and  Dunlap's  Histories 
of  the  Stage  and  Arts  of  Design,  owe  much  to  him. 

Mr.  Poe,  in  an  admirable  sketch,  a  little  over-colored,  in  his 
Literati,  thus  graphically  paints  the  address  and  conversa 
tional  powers  of  Dr.  Francis: 

"  His  address  is  the  most  genial  that  can  be  conceived — its 
bon-kommie  irresistible.  He  speaks  in  a  loud,  clear,  hearty 
tone,  dogmatically,  and  his  head  thrown  back  and  his  chest 


2^2  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

out ;  never  waits  for  an  introduction  to  any  lady ;  slaps  a  per 
fect  stranger  on  the  back,  and  calls  him  *  Doctor'  or  *  Learned 
Theban  ;'  pats  every  lady  on  the  head,  and  (if  she  be  pretty 
and  petite,)  designates  her  by  some  such  title  as  « My  pocket 
edition  of  the  Lives  of  the  Saints.'  His  conversation  proper 
is  a  sort  of  Roman  punch,  made  up  of  tragedy,  comedy,  and 
the  broadest  of  all  possible  farces.  He  has  a  natural,  felicit 
ous  flow-  of  talk,  always  overswelling  the  boundaries  and 
sweeping  everything  before  it,  right  and  left.  He  is  very 
earnest,  intense,  emphatic ;  thumps  the  table  with  his  fist ; 
shocks  the  nerves  of  the  ladies.  His/orte,  after  all,  is  humor, 
the  richest  conceivable,— a  compound  of  Swift,  Rabelais,  and 
the  clown  in  the  pantomime." 

Of  his  writings,  miscellaneous  and  medical,  we  have  space 
but  for  a  brief  resume. 

The  Address  before  the  Agricultural  Society  is  an  elegant 
essay,  giving  the  history  of  the  art,  and  the  views  held 
respecting  it,  in  the  chief  epochs  of  modern  civilization  in 
England,  France,  and  this  country  in  particular.  It  is  full  of 
ingenious  suggestions,  and  is  studded  with  vivid  portraits  of 
the  great  patrons  of  this,  one  of  the  most  delightful  of  the 
fine  arts,  and  which  is  constantly  on  the  advance  in  this 
country. 

The  Address  before  the  Literary  Society  of  Columbia  Col 
lege  is  mainly  devoted  to  a  masterly  biographical  sketch  of 
Chancellor  Livingston,  with  which  President  Madison  was  so 
much  gratified,  that  he  wrote  Dr.  Francis  a  congratulatory 
letter  of  thanks,  for  this  valuable  contribution  to  American 
history.  As  this  Address  is  now  out  of  print,  the  reader  will 
thank  us  for  telling  him  that  a  very  full  extract  from  it,  com 
prising  the  essential  portion,  may  be  read  in  Knapp's  Ameri 
can  Biography,  which  forms  the  Sixth  part  of  the  Treasury  of 
Knowledge. — [New  York:  Conner  &  Cooke.  1833.] 


DP.   JOHN    W.   FRANCIS.  273 

The  letter  on  the  cholera,  and  the  observations  on  the 
Avon  waters,  are  highly  valuable  medical  papers.  The 
former  has  attracted  general  notice,  been  translated  and 
recommended  at  Havana,  by  the  authorities.  During  the 
three  seasons  of  cholera  in  New  York  city— in  1832,  in  1834, 
and  in  1849 — Dr.  Francis  was  untiring,  ever  at  his  post,  a 
devoted  and  faithful  practitioner  and  philanthropist,  fearless 
of  danger  to  himself,  though  full  of  a  noble  anxiety  for  others, 
adapting  his  profound  science  with  readiness,  and  most 
efficient  skill,  to  the  disease.  During  the  yellow  fever  of 
1822,  and  the  previous  visitation  of  that  scourge,  he  was 
indefatigable,  and  came  very  near  being  added  to  the  list  of 
the  victims.  What  hero  so  bold,  what  soldier  so  daring,  as 
the  dauntless  physician,  full  of  knowledge,  hope  and  spirit,  in 
such  a  crisis  ?  Truly  did  the  poet  exclaim,  of  the  skillful 
Machaon : 

"  A  wise  physician,  skill'd  our  wounds  to  Leal, 
Is  more  than  armies  to  the  public  wenl." 

POPE'S  Homer's  Iliad,  Book  xi.,  636-7. 

The  sulphur  springs,  at  Avon,  have  relieved  many  a  suf 
ferer,  and  many  who  imbibe  these  life-restoring  waters  little 
know  to  whom  they  are  indebted  for  the  clearest  elucidation 
of  their  virtues  which  has  been  given  to  the  public.  New 
York  is  as  rich  as  Virginia  in  sulphur  springs.  There  are 
three,  of  the  very  first  class ;  at  Richfield,  Otsego  county, 
some  fourteen  miles  from  Cooperstown,  (of  which  we  can 
speak  from  personal  knowledge  of  their  admirably  cura 
tive  effects,)  at  Sharon,  the  more  fashionable  resort,  and  at 
Avon. 

The  discourse  on  Natural  History  is  worthy  of  a  review 
by  itself — so  full,  so  comprehensive,  and  yet  so  compact. 
It  is  a  succinct  treatise,  which,  by  a  little  of  the  arts  of  com- 
12* 


274  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

position,  might  be  readily  expanded  into  a  volume.  This 
discourse  developes  an  immense  variety  of  scientific  know 
ledge,  and,  for  style,  is  deserving  of  very  high  praise,  and 
has  been,  in  connection  with  his  other  addresses  and  bio 
graphies,  justly  characterized  as  "  models  of  fine  writing, 
just  sufficiently  tamed  down  by  an  indomitable  common 
sense." 

The  Anniversary  Discourse,  before  the  Academy  of  Medi 
cine,  we  must  select,  however,  as  the  work,  by  which  those 
who  are  yet  to  read  these  fine  pieces  of  composition,  may 
get  the  general  idea  of  the  style  and  manner  of  our  author. 
And  we  may  here  add,  that,  among  the  various  collections 
of  "  Miscellanies,"  "  Literary  Remains,"  etc.,  so  frequently 
put  forth,  few  volumes  will  be  more  interesting  than  one  con 
taining  a  selection  from  the  addresses,  discourses,  and  bio 
graphical  notices  of  Dr.  Francis. 

We  had  the  pleasure  of  hearing  this  admirable  oration. 
It  was  delivered  before  an  audience  of  nearly  four  thousand 
persons,  the  majority  professional  and  scientific,  with  the 
flower  of  New  York  society  and  fashion.  About  as  large  a 
number  as  obtained  entrance  into  the  Tabernacle  were 
obliged  to  leave,  for  want  of  space  to  accommodate  them, 
and  the  fact  deserves  to  be  recorded,  that  no  scientific  dis 
course  has  ever  collected  so  large  an  audience,  or  com 
manded  such  profound  attention,  in  New  York  city — a  dis 
course  of  over  one  hundred  printed  pages,  and  occupying 
over  two  hours  in  the  delivery,  that  could  so  fix  the  attention 
of  such  an  assemblage,  must  have  had  rare  merits.  It  is, 
indeed,  an  encyclopedic  resume  of  the  present  state  of  the 
art,  in  all  of  its  departments,  of  each  of  which,  from  long 
study  and  wide  practice,  the  orator  was  master ;  compre 
hensive  and  yet  concise,  richly  freighted  with  learning, 


DR.   JOHN    W.    FRANCIS.  2*75 

strong  sense  and  broad  views,  in  its  historical  portion, 
while  its  biographical  reminiscences  were  full  of  life  and 
spirit  In  its  latter  half,  it  contains  a  gallery  of  medical 
portraits,  of  the  great  lights  of  the  profession,  now  ex 
tinct. 

The  New  York  feeling  of  the  author  comes  up,  at  times, 
most  agreeably.  Dr.  Francis,  a  true  Knickerbocker,  watches 
with  pride  the  progress  of  New  York  city.  Full  as  well 
as  any  writer  he  referred  to,  on  this  ground,  did  he  devote 
himself  to  it ;  he  could  accumulate  a  mass  of  information, 
antiquarian  and  statistical,  as  well  as  picturesque  and  hu 
morous,  that  would  give  the  slanderers  of  New  York  pain, 
and  show  that  she  had  a  distinct  character  and  claims  of  her 
own,  not  to  be  set  aside.  Of  much  of  the  discourse,  only  a 
professional  reader  can  justly  appreciate  the  thoroughness 
and  accuracy.  But  there  are  portions  all  must  admire. 

Biography  has  been  a  favorite  recreation  with  Dr.  Francis, 
and  to  his  faithful  and  affectionate  pen  we  are  indebted  for  a 
number  of  most  excellent  notices,  and  personal  accounts  of 
individuals,  eminent  for  professional  skill  and  learning,  and 
for  personal  worth.  These  lives  are  scattered  up  and  down 
several  works :  the  Family  Magazine,  edited  by  Dr.  Doane  ; 
the  American  Medical  and  Philosophical  Register,  edited  by 
Drs.  Hosack  and  Francis,  Knapp's  American  Biography,  etc. 
The  lives  we  can  now  refer  to  distinctly,  as  from  his  pen,  are 
those  of  Cadwallader  Golden  and  his  great  uncle,  Dr.  Col- 
den,  Thomas  Eddy,  Drs.  Mitchell,  Miller,  McNeven,  Jones, 
Rush,  Striugham,  Williamson,  the  capital  sketch  of  Bishop 
Berkeley,  etc.,  etc.  Medical  biography  is  under  real  obliga 
tions  to  Dr.  Francis,  and,  in  this  nice  art,  the  portraiture  of 
character,  he  undoubtedly  excels. 

Of  his  medical  writings,  (we  have  noticed  but  two  of  his 


276  CHARACTERS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

tracts,  of  general  interest,)  we  speak  on  the  authority  of  those 
best  qualified  to  judge,  when  we  give  them  no  more  than 
due  credit  for  scientific  accuracy,  for  a  rich  illustration  of 
facts,  for  comprehensive,  and  often  original  views,  and  for  a 
novel  and  successful  application  of  former  discoveries.  Many 
of  these  have  an  European  reputation.  His  medical  thesis  on 
mercury  was  well  received  at  once,  abroad,  and  his  cholera 
pamphlet  was  translated  into  Spanish,  and  propagated  by  the 
authorities  at  Havana,  during  the  season  of  the  pestilence, 
when  it  was  issued.  At  least  a  score  of  his  professional  arti 
cles  are  held  in  high  esteem  by  the  faculty,  in  Great  Britain 
and  on  the  continent. 

Dr.  Francis  has,  with  reliable  accuracy,  from  an  intimate 
acquaintance  with  that  fell  disorder  to  which  his  father  fell  a 
victim,  and  from  which  he  very  narrowly  escaped  death  him 
self,  established  the  position  of  the  immunity  cf  the  constitu 
tion  from  a  second  attack  of  yellow  fever.  He  has  written  a 
'  most  able  paper,  entitled  the  Anatomy  of  Drunkenness,  the 
universal  circulation  of  which  would,  we  have  no  doubt, 
contribute  in  large  degree  to  the  attainment  of  that  bene 
volent  ideal  which  is  the  aim  of  the  temperance  societies. 

At  home,  in  one  department  at  least,  he  is  supreme — 
in  all  the  delicate  diseases  of  females  ;  nor  is  he  less  suc 
cessful  in  his  treatment  of  a  variety  of  disorders  to  which 
the  human  frame  and  constitution  are  subject. 


XXXIV. 

WILLIAM   S.    MOUNT.* 

THE  classic  comic  painters  of  all  countries  are  few  in  number. 
A  score  of  masterly  artists  in  portraiture  may  be  enumerated 
for  every  single  humorous  genius  in  the  art  of  design.  The 
Flemish  school,  with  Teniers,  Ostade,  Jan  Steen,  Gerard 
Douw,  Brou wer,  and  Mieris,  is  undoubtedly  the  richest,  both 
in  number  of  artists  and  in  variety  of  comic  subjects.  The 
Spanish  school,  with  Murillo  at  the  head,  comes  next.  And 
although,  in  respect  to  character,  expression,  thought,  satire 
and  dramatic  power,  no  one  master  in  this  department  can, 
for  a  moment,  be  compared  with  Hogarth,  the  English  school 
has  few  others  to  boast  of.  Wilkie,  who  approaches  most 
nearly,  was  a  Scotchman,  as  well  as  the  great  predecessor  of 
Cruickshank,  (the  inimitable  caricaturist  of  this  century,) 
Gilray,  who  was  the  Cruickshank  in  political  caricature  of  his 
day.  Maclise  is,  we  believe,  an  Irishman  ;  and  Leslie,  with 
Newton,  (delicious  humorists  of  the  school  of  Addisou,  Gold 
smith,  Sterne,  and  Irving,)  delicate  limners,  graceful,  spirited 
and  Virgilian,  displaying  in  their  charming  productions, 
the  amenity,  gentle  beauties,  and  subtle  refinements  of  those 
masters  of  authorship,  we  claim  as  American,  partly  from 
their  early  education  here,  and  partly  from  their  American 
illustrations  of  Irving. 

The  French  pride  themselves,  and  justly,  on  the  possession 
of  the  genteel  as  well  in  painting  as  in  style ;  but  with  all 
his  courtly  elegance,  neither  can  Watteau  be  fairly  con 
sidered  a  humorist,  nor  Coypel,  though  he  has  illustrated 
Don  Quixote  with  so  much  vivacity  and  effect. 
*1861. 


2*78  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

The  paintings  of  W.  S.  Mount,  one  of  the  few  American 
artists,  that  deserve  to  be  called  painters,  are  of  a  strictly 
national  character;  the  pride  and  boast,  not  only  of  his 
native  Long  Island,  nor  yet  of  the  State  of  New  York  solely, 
but  of  the  whole  country.  Of  an  inferior  grade,  in  the  same 
department,  are  the  pictures  of  Bingham,  Ranney,  Wood- 
ville,  Edmonds,  and  Clonney,  all  of  whom  are  subsequent  to 
him,  in  point  of  time ;  and  although  several  of  their  paint 
ings  are  of  great  merit,  evincing  observation  and  study,  full 
of  character  and  expression,  yet  none  of  them  can  justly  be 
compared,  in  point  of  equality,  or  with  any  fair  pretensions 
to  rivalry,  with  the  comic  designs  of  Mount. 

Doctors  of  Law  and  Divinity,  Judges  and  Bishops,  can  be 
easily  created  by  conventions  and  councils,  but  a  true  humorist 
is  worth  a  county  of  such  dignitaries.  "What  does  the  world 
know  or  care  about  the  Dutch  theologians  or  commentators, 
who  carried  their  heads  high  during  the  sixteenth  and 
seventeenth  centuries  ?  But  the  Dutch  school  of  art  of  that 
period  is  as  well  known  as  anything  in  Holland,  to  all  out  of 
it.  Those  dull,  learned  professors,  who  lecture  on  the  genius 
of  the  very  men,  after  death  has  made  them  immortal,  upon 
whom  living  they  would  affect  to  look  down,  talk  of  comic 
pictures  as  of  the  Ethiopian  farces,  as  the  lowest  phase  of 
intellectual  effort.  But  how  many  libraries  of  sermons,  and 
controversial  theology,  and  church  history,  may  be  bought 
for  the  smallest  collection  of  Teniers  and  Ostade  ! 

Among  those,  too,  who  affect  a  liking  for  art  in  this  walk, 
how  few  correctly  appreciate  it ;  placing  the  department  of 
humorous  description  and  comic  satire  below  portrait  and 
landscape,  to  say  nothing  of  what  passes  under  the  style  and 
title  of  history.  In  painting,  however,  as  in  literature, 
familiar  history  is  in  general  far  more  valuable  and  directly 


WILLIAM    8.    MOUNT.  270 

interesting  than  the  so-called  heroic  phases  of  art.  Every 
thing  depends  on  the  artist  and  his  mode  of  treatment  of  a 
subject.  A  great  artist  will  make  more  of  an  ordinary  scene 
than  the  inferior  genius  will  be  able  to  create  out  of  the 
noblest  materials.  True,  the  grand  style,  in  the  hands  of  a 
Raphael,  a  Titian,  a  Rubens,  is  above  anything  of  Dutch  or 
Flemish  art.  We  are  not  instituting  a  comparison  between 
the  divine  Italians  and  the  homely  Dutchmen ;  rather  would 
we  oppose  a  first-rate  artist  of  the  actual  to  a  second-rate 
painter  of  the  ideal  school.  Something  germane  to  this 
subject  are  the  following  remarks  of  Leslie,  whose  single 
authority  is  sufficient  to  decide  a  point  of  this  kind.  In  a 
letter  to  Dunlap,  he  writes,  speaking  of  Newton :  "  For  my 
own  part,  I  had  much  rather  have  been  the  painter  of  one 
of  Sir  Joshua  Reynold's  best  portraits,  or  one  of  Claude's 
landscapes,  than  of  any  historical  painting  by  Guido,  Domeui- 
chino,  or  Aunibal  Carracci,  I  ever  saw.  If  dramatic  inven 
tion,  a  true  expression  of  the  passions  and  feelings  of  human 
nature,  and  a  perfect  knowledge  of  physiognomy,  are  to  be 
estimated  by  their  rarity,  Hogarth  was  the  greatest  painter 
the  world  ever  saw.  Yet,  according  to  the  received  classifi 
cation,  his  art  must  take  a  lower  rank  than  that  of  his  father- 
in-law,  Sir  Thomas  Thoruhill,  who  designed  the  dome  of  St. 
Paul's  with  the  history  of  the  saint  from  whom  the  church 
is  named."  In  Heine's  letters  we  find  an  idea  expressed  so 
similar  to  this,  and  with  such  clearness,  that  we  append  it  by 
way  of  corollary  to  the  above.  He  is  contrasting  Goethe  and 
Schiller,  and  in  his  light,  fleering  tone  of  sarcastic  irony,  which 
probes  a  subject  as  effectually  as  the  finest  serious  analysis,  he 
declares :  "  Those  highly  painted,  those  purely  ideal  forms, 
those  altar  images  of  virtue  and  morality,  which  Schiller  has 
erected,  are  far  easier  to  produce  than  those  frail,  every-day, 


280  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

contaminated  beings  that  Goethe  reveals  to  us  in  his 'works. 
Indifferent  painters  ever  present  the  full-length  picture  of 
some  holy  saint  upon  the  canvas ;  but  it  requires  a  con 
summate  master  to  paint  a  Spanish  beggar,  or  a  Dutch 
peasant  suffering  a  tooth  to  be  extracted,  or  hideous  old 
women  as  we  see  them  in  the  little  Dutch  cabinet  pictures, 
true  to  life  and  perfect  in  art.  The  grand  and  fearful  are  of 
much  easier  representation  in  art  than  the  trifling  and  the 
little.  The  Egyptian  sorcerers  could  imitate  many  of  the 
acts  of  Moses,  as  the  snake,  the  blow,  the  frogs  even ;  but 
when  he  did  acts  much  more  seemingly  easy  for  the  magi 
cians,  namely,  brought  vermin  upon  the  land,  then  they  con 
fessed  their  inability,  and  said,  '  That  is  the  finger  of  God.' " 

If  any  further  criticism  were  necessary,  we  might  add,  that 
two  exquisitely  just  and  original  critics  of  the  present  cen 
tury,  admirable  writers  upon  art  as  well  as  literature,  Hazlitt 
and  Lamb,  in  their  essays  upon  the  works  of  Hogarth,  have 
abundantly  and  brilliantly  illustrated  and  confirmed  this 
position, 

A  biographical  sketch  of  the  artist,  whose  name  stands  at 
the  head  of  this  paper,  may  be  comprised  within  a  brief 
space,  the  external  events  of  his  life  being  few,  and  not  in 
any  sense  extraordinary.  The  few  facts  are  gleaned  from 
Dunlap's  meagre  notice,  and  confirmed  on  the  personal  au 
thority  of  the  artist. 

The  youngest  of  three  brothers,  artists,  our  painter,  the  son 
of  a  substantial  Long  Island  farmer,  was  born  at  Setauket, 
Suffolk  Co.,  Nov.  26,  1507.  Up  to  the  age  of  seventeen  he 
had  been  bred  "  a  farmer's  boy,"  as  he  himself  expresses  it, 
and  which  early  education  sufficiently  explains  the  character 
of  the  subjects  of  his  art— all  rural  scenes  of  a  domestic  cha 
racter,  or,  as  in  most  cases,  of  out  of-door  scenes  and  occupa- 


WILLIAM    8.    MOUNT.  281 

tions.  At  that  age,  he  came  up  to  New  York  and  com 
menced  an  apprenticeship  as  sign  and  ornamental  painter,  to 
his  eldest  brother,  Henry  S.  Mount,  who  pursued  that 
branch  of  painting,  although  with  powers  and  execution  much 
superior  to  it,  especially  excellent  in  pieces  of  still-life.  Feeling 
no  doubt  an  instinctive  superiority  to  this  occupation,  the 
future  artist  relinquished  it  for  a  higher  walk.  He  com 
menced  seeking  after  good  pictures  as  models,  and  entered  a 
student  of  the  National  Academy  of  Design,  1826.  The 
next  year  he  returned  to  the  country,  partly  on  account  of 
his  health  and  for  recreation,  but  chiefly  from  a  native  pre 
ference  for  its  quiet,  and  the  innocent  pleasures  it  affords.  As 
a  more  congenial  residence,  from  early  associations,  and  the 
proper  field  of  his  labors,  no  less  than  from  its  intrinsic  at 
tractions,  he  has  always  (except  for  a  short  interval)  continued 
to  reside  there ;  coming  up  to  the  city  on  brief  periodical 
visits  of  business. 

In  1828,  he  painted  his  first  picture,  a  portrait  of  himself. 
In  1829,  recommenced  painting,  in  New  York,  portraits. 
History  early  fired  his  ambition,  and  he  imagined  himself 
destined  to  succeed  in  Scripture  pieces.  He  has  not  entirely  re 
linquished  this  fancy  yet.  Liston  came  out  in  tragedy,  and, 
as  a  matter  of  history,  comic  geniuses  have  in  general  mado 
a  beginning  in  a  similar  way.  Time,  sooner  or  later,  corrects 
the  error.  The  first  painting  he  exhibited  at  the  Academy 
was  Christ  raising  the  daughter  of  Jairus,  followed  by  Saul 
and  the  Witch  of  Eudor.  But  he  soon  found  his  true  line. 
His  first  comic  picture  was  exhibited  in  1830 — the  Kustic 
Dance.  A  few  years  after,  the  judgment  of  the  great  artist 
of  the  country  was  thus  expressed.  In  a  letter  to  Dunlap, 
August,  1834,  by  Allston,  occurs  the  following  most  judi 
cious  criticism,  cordially  presented  :  "  I  *aw  some  pieces  in 


282  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

the  Athenaeum  (of  Boston)  last  year,  by  a  young  man  of 
your  city,  Mount,  which  showed  great  power  of  expression. 
He  has,  too,  a  firm,  decided  pencil,  and  seems  to  have  a  good 
notion  of  a  figure.  If  he  would  study  Ostade  and  Jan  Steen, 
and  master  their  chiaro-oscuro,  there  is  nothing,  as  I  see,  to 
prevent  his  becoming  a  great  artist  in  the  line  he  has  chosen." 
Had  Mount  gone  abroad  at  that  time,  he  might  very  pro 
bably  have  learned  new  secrets  of  coloring  ;  but  as  probably 
he  would  have  been  confused  by  the  brilliancy  of  so  much 
excellence,  and,  in  his  attempt  to  gain  too  much  facility, 
have  lost  his  distinctive  local  freshness,  and  untaught,  natural 
beauties.  A  truly  national  painter  might  have  been  sacri 
ficed  to  the  varied  accomplishments  of  a  tasteful  artist  of  the 
schools.  Perhaps  it  was  wisest  for  him  to  have  remained  at 
home.  Copies  of  some  of  his  most  characteristic  pictures 
might  be  bought  up  in  England,  by  wealthy  connoisseurs,  at 
a  liberal  rate,  and  one  field  still  remains  open  to  him  which 
he  could  worthily  occupy — the  Southern  negro,  plantation 
life,  cornshuckings,  &c.  He  would  find  open-handed  patrons 
among  the  cultivated  and  opulent  planters.  His  heads  of 
negroes,  in  Right  and  Left,  and  the  Lucky  Throw,  are  the 
finest  Ethiopian  portraits  ever  put  upon  canvas. 

Mount  has  painted  some  fifty  pictures  which  he  would  be 
willing  to  acknowledge.  Among  the  best  of  these  are  Men 
Husking  Corn,  Walking  the  Crack,  the  Sportsman's  Last 
Visit,  the  Raffle,  the  Courtship,  the  Tough  Story,  the  Barn- 
Floor  Dance,  Birding,  Turning  the  Leaf,  Undutiful  Boys, 
Bargaining  for  a  Horse,  Cider-Making  on  Long  Island,  Boys 
Trapping,  Nooning,  Power  of  Music,  and  Music  is  Conta 
gious,  Just  in  Time,  Right  and  Left,  California  News,  the 
Lucky  Throw,  and  Who'll  Turn  Grindstone  ?  his  latest  efforts. 

He  has  been  so  universally  considered  the  comic  painter 


WILLIAM    8.    MOUNT.  283 

of  tho  country,  that  his  power  in  portraits  has  been  over 
looked.  Portraits  of  Bishop  Onderdonk,  Rev.  Drs.  Seabury 
and  Carmichael,  lion.  Jeremiah  Johnson,  of  Brooklyn,  (fee., 
attest  his  skill  in  depicting  the  human  countenance,  in  catch 
ing  the  genuine  expression  of  the  sitter  and  fixing  it  on  the 
canvas.  One  of  the  latest  productions  of  the  artist  in  this  de 
partment  is  a  portrait  of  E.  H.  Nicoll,  Esq.,  exhibited  at  the 
annual  exposition  of  the  Academy,  some  years  ago,  and  which 
was  pronounced  by  Frothingham,  (a  master  in  portraiture;)  to 
be  one  of  the  very  best  heads  in  the  collection.  Since  then, 
he  has  just  finished  a  head  of  Mrs.  William  Nicoll,  of  Islip, 
which  has  given  the  utmost  satisfaction  to  the  family. 

Mount  sometimes  speaks  of  comic  design  as  so  slightly  re 
munerative,  on  tho  whole,  though  good  prices  are  paid  for 
the  few  orders  he  receives,  that  if  he  should  paint  to  satisfy 
himself,  he  would  soon  qualify  himself  for  an  honorary  de 
gree  at  that  modern  temple  of  artistic  fame — the  alms-house. 

Doubtless  many  would  be  gratified  to  be  immortalized  to 
posterity,  in  a  portrait  by  Mount,  even  if  the  head  was  not  so 
admirably  painted,  with  the  truth  and  fidelity  of  his  faces 
and  figures  in  his  familiar  scenes.  But  he  might,  if  ho  chose 
to  devote  himself  to  it,  be  at  least  as  successful  as  many  of 
our  portrait  painters,  who,  with  a  tithe  of  his  genius,  enjoy 
high  position  and  command  handsome  prices. 

To  return,  however,  to  his  peculiarly  original  works,  those 
which  have  given  him  an  individual  reputation.  Some  of 
these  have  been,  for  fifteen  years  or  so,  locked  up,  in  private 
collections,  which  we  have  not  seen ;  others  we  saw  so  long 
since,  that  we  hesitate  to  speak  of  them  confidently.  Some 
ten  or  a  dozen  masterpieces,  however,  are  familiar  to  us,  and 
must  be  to  our  readers.  Of  these,  two  are  in  the  New  York 
Gallery,  several  are  already  engraved,  two  are  now  in  Paris, 


284  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

and  one  is  now  in  the  engraver's  hands ;  and,  during  the  last 
two  or  three  years,  some  of  his  finest  have  been  in  the  exhi 
bitions  of  the  Academy,  the  Art-Union,  and  the  rooms  of 
Goupil  &  Co. 

In  a  brief  review  of  his  works,  we  cannot  enter  into  any 
detailed  description  :  a  few  words  must  suffice. 

Bargaining  for  a  Horse,  in  the  New  York  Gallery,  and 
which  is  to  be  one  of  the  Art- Union  engravings  for  next  year, 
and  Nooning,  engraved  by  Alfred  Jones,  a  capital  engraving, 
appear  to  us  his  chefs  d'ceuvre  in  his  out-of-door  scenes.  In 
the  first  picture,  remark  the  diplomatic  manner  of  the  traf 
fickers  ;  how  cool  and  indifferent ;  whittling  ;  their  attitudes, 
like  their  dress,  easy  and  slouching. — Nooning  is  nature  itself, 
a  perfect  transcript  from  life ;  how  close  and  sultry  the  mid 
day  heats ;  how  lazily  lolls  the  sleeping  negro  on  the  hay, 
whose  ear  the  boy  is  tickling  with  a  straw,  which  produces  a 
slightsmile !  The  white  laborers  are  naturally  disposed  about 
with  their  farming  implements.  The  landscape  is  unmistak 
ably  that  of  Long  Island,  bare  and  homely,  yet  with  an  air  of 
thrift  and  comfort.  In  all  of  his  productions,  the  details  are 
carefully  painted,  but  in  some  of  them,  separate  faces  or  some 
special  object  form  the  most  attractive  features. 

Power  of  Music  and  Music  is  Contagious  are,  like  most  of 
his  works,  of  cabinet  size  and  companion  pieces.  The  titles 
tell  the  story,  which  is  narrated  with  pictorial  effect.  They 
represent  the  love  of  music  at  different  periods  of  life.  The 
phrenological  hobby  of  the  artist  is  apparent  in  the  musical 
bump  of  the  negro,  whose  organ  of  tune  in  the  second  picture 
has  been  much  developed.  The  faces  of  the  boys  are  full  of 
sweetness.  California  News  is  a  hit  at  the  times.  A  group 
of  Hsteners'surround  the  reader  of  an  "  extra,"  containing  the 
miraculous  developments  of  gold  discovery  at  the  El  Dorado; 


WILLIAM    B.    MOUNT.  285 

the  scene,  a  village  tavern  bar-room,  hung  round,  among  other 
ornaments,  with  a  handbill  advertisement  of  a  vessel  up  for 
the  mines.  This  is,  altogether,  a  capital  thing,  full  of  telling 
effects ;  an  historical  painting,  though  of  an  humble  order,  in 
the  genuine  sense. 

Within  the  last  year  Mr.  Mount  has  been  executing  orders 
(of  which  Just  in  Time,  Right  and  Left,  and  the  Lucky  Throw, 
are  three  already  completed)  for  the  enterprising  French  pub 
lishing  and  print-selling  house  of  Goupil  &  Co.,  whose  agent, 
Mr.  Schauss  had  the  taste  and  judgment  to  select  Mount, 
as  the  most  national  of  our  artists,  to  introduce  to  the  French 
and  European  public.  These  pictures  are  tastefully  lithograph 
ed  in  Paris  by  La  Salle,  a  spirited  hand.  In  this  enterprise, 
he  has  ventured  on  the  experiment  of  combining  portrait  and 
comic  design.  The  heads  are  life-size,  half-lengths  ;  but  to 
our  eye,  what  they  gain  as  portraits,  they  lose  as  humorous 
pictures.  The  classic  size  for  comic  pieces  has  been  diminu 
tive.  Yet  they  are  truly  excellent,  and  we  must  add  a  few 
words  by  way  of  description. 

Just  in  Time  represents  a  handsome  young  countryman, 
who,  violin  in  hand,  has  just  hit  the  proper  pitch.  This  pic 
ture  is  in  the  exhibition  of  the  present  year.  It  has  been 
beautifully  lithographed,  and  is  worthy  of  a  rural  Adonis  by 
Morland. 

Right  and  Left  is  a  negro  fiddler  calling  out  the  figures  of 
a  dance  at  a  ball,  fully  equal  to  the  last-mentioned.  The 
negro  is  a  comely  specimen  of  his  race,  and  something  of  a 
village  dandy,  to  boot. 

The  Lucky  Throw — a  negro  who  has  won  a  goose  at  a 
raffle — inimitable  for  spirit,  expression,  details,  and  coloring. 
Indeed,  the  coloring  in  these  last  three  is  much  superior  to 
that  in  his  earlier  works :  a  fine  tone  is  prevalent,  and  thero 
is  no  sign  of  carelessness  or  neglect. 


286  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

His  last  work,  in  this  year's  exhibition  of  the  Academy, 
Who'll  Turn  Grindstone  ?  illustrates  a  well-known  apologue 
of  Dr.  Franklin,  impressing  the  moral  of  the  heartless  con 
duct  of  worldly  men  towards  those  whose  good  offices  they 
have  exhausted.  The  countenance  of  the  boy  is  the  trait  we 
like  best  in  this  picture.  It  reminds  one  of  the  amenity  of 
Gainsborough's  children,  and  of  the  faces  in  the  Truant 
Gamblers.  The  barn  is  as  natural  as  possible.  It  was  painted 
for  Mr.  Sturges,  the  President  of  the  New  York  Gallery,  and 
a  liberal  patron  of  art. 

Mount  has  been  fortunate  in  his  patrons — the  late  judicious 
lover  and  munificent  friend  of  art,  Luman  Reed,  Esq.,  his 
successor  in  the  Presidency,  James  Lenox,  Esq.,  Mrs.  Gideon 
Lee,  Messrs.  Leupp,  Goupil  &  Co.,  gentlemen  of  discrimina 
tion  and  cultivated  taste.  The  prices  he  is  paid  are  generally 
higher  than  those  he  places  upon  his  productions  ;  and  yet, 
although  handsome  for  this  country,  he  would  probably  re 
ceive  double  or  thrice  the  amount  abroad. 

Commonly  considered  indolent,  he  is  indefatigable  in  ela 
borating  his  productions.  Fastidious  and  full  of  conscientious 
integrity,  he  is  accused  of  slowness  by  those  who  are  ignorant 
of  the  internal,  intellectual  labor  of  the  artist,  who,  faithful  to 
his  cherished  conceptions,  seeks  to  work  them  out  by  dili 
gence  and  pains.  Much  is  going  on  in  the  mind,  while  the 
artist  may  not  touch  his  brush  for  days  or  weeks.  He  is 
also  much  censured  for  his  coloring,  at  one  time  too  cold, 
again  too  hot.  It  is  true,  expression  and  character  are  his 
fortes,  coloring  is  not.  Yet  he  is  sometimes  highly  successful 
as  in  his  later  works,  and  almost  always  his  coloring  suits 
his  peculiar  class  of  subjects,  which,  homely  and  rustic  as 
they  are,  neither  require  nor  approve  vivid  tints. 

Mr.  Mount  is  now  living  at   Stoney  Brook,  some  three 


WILLIAM    8.    MOUNT.  287 

miles  from  Setauket,  on  the  Sound  side  of  Long  Island,  with 
his  married  sister.  His  studio  is  as  rustic  as  possible,  and 
nothing  could  be  more  appropriate.  It  is  in  the  upper  story 
or  garret  of  an  old-fashioned  cottage,  a  comfortable  home 
stead,  with  the  light  artistically  let  in  from  the  roof. 

Mr.  Shepherd  Mount,  well  known  as  a  successful  portrait 
painter,  for  which  department  of  his  art  he  has  a  fine  feeling, 
and  especially  for  color,  is  an  able  and  intelligent  artist.  His 
drawings  and  sketches  are  even  better  than  most  of  his  por 
traits  ;  and,  in  pieces  of  still-life,  he  has  done  some  capital 
things.  He  has  also  a  turn  for  landscape.  It  is  delightful 
to  witness  the  frank  and  generous  pride  of  the  brothers  in 
each  other,  and  their  family  connections,  an  instance  of  bro 
therly  sympathy  and  disinterestedness  as  rare  as  it  is  grateful. 

The  scenery  about  Stony  Brook  is  not  beautiful  nor  ro 
mantic,  but  has  a  certain  rural  charm  that  confirms  local  af 
fection,  when  a  more  picturesque  scene  might  fade  out  of  the 
fancy.  It  has  that  ever-delicious  repose  of  the  country,  that 
air  of  quiet  and  seclusion,  so  full  of  unobtrusive  beauty  to  the 
citizen,  tired  of  the  turmoil  of  a  town  life.  It  was  a  favorite 
resort  of  the  late  Henry  Inman.  The  country  about  here  is 
one  of  the  oldest  settlements  on  the  Island.  It  has  some  an 
tiquities  of  its  own,  the  chief  of  which  is  the  quaint  little  old 
Caroline  church,  an  Episcopal  church,  erected  during  the 
reign  of  George  II.  and  named  after  his  consort.  Old  farm 
houses  and  aged  people  are  not  unfrequently  met,  and  com 
fort  with  contentment  is  the  ruling  characteristic  of  the  neigh 
borhood.  Here,  in  serenity,  and  in  the  enjoyment  of  social 
pleasures,  practising  a  genial  hospitality,  with  abundance  of 
good  humor  and  native  courtesy,  combining  much  intelli 
gence  and  true  natural  refinement,  reside  a  pleasant  society, 
of  which  the  Mount  family  forms  the  centre  of  attraction. 


288  CHARACTERS    AND    CRITICISMS. 

Pleasant  excursions,  and  little  parties  at  home  or  in  the  neigh 
borhood,  relieve  the  toils  of  the  studio,  the  farm,  the  manu 
factory;  and  more  real  happiness  is  found  than  amid  the 
splendid  luxuries  of  the  city. 

The  place  of  W.  S.  Mount,  as  an  artist,  may  be  considered 
as  not  easily  assignable.  He  is  an  original  painter,  a  follow 
er  of  no  school,  an  imitator  of  no  master.  But  yet  he  may 
be  classed  generally  with  English  painters,  as  partaking  of 
certain  of  their  qualities  and  as  possessing  similar  attributes. 
Mount  is  not  merely  a  comic  painter,  and  by  no  means  a  cari 
caturist.  At  the  same  time,  he  is  much  above  the  most  suc 
cessful  painter  of  still-life.  His  forte  properly  is  rustic  pic- 
turesqueness,  and  heightened  by  true  humorous  descriptive 
power.  He  is  something  akin  to  Wilkie,  with  traits  of  the 
better  part  of  Morland  and  a  good  deal  of  Gainsborough  in  him. 
Some  of  his  cabinet  pieces,  with  a  variety  of  figures  deserve  to  be 
ranked  in  the  same  category  with  the  admirable  pictures  of 
the  Dutch  and  Flemish  schools.  Of  course,  we  would  not  in 
sult  Mount  by  declaring  such  an  extravagance,  as  that  be 
equalled  Ostade  in  coloring,  or  Denner  in  minute  finish.  The 
general  characteristics  of  his  paintings,  however,  are  much  the 
same  with  theirs. 

A  comic  artist  without  doubt,  he  is  still  essentially  a  rural 
painter.  There  is  nothing  of  the  town  life  in  his  pictures :  all 
are  imbued  with  feeling  of  the  country — its  freshness,  its  foli 
age,  its  sweet  airs  and  soul-calming  secret  recesses.  His  best 
works  are,  in  a  word,  humorous  pastorals,  with  sweetness  and 
fine-tempered  satire,  (where  there  is  any  at  all ;)  no  bitterness, 
no  moral  obliquity  or  personal  deformity  impair  their  effect ; 
they  present  a  picture  of  country  life,  at  once  satisfactory  for 
its  truth  and  agreeable  in  its  aspect  and  general  features. 

The  character  of  the  artist  is  reflected  in  his  works, — his 
sweetness  of  temper,  purity  of  feeling,  truthfulness,  gayety  of 


WILLIAM    8.    MOUNT.  289 

heart,  humorous  observation,    and    appreciation  of  homely 
beauties  of  nature  that  are  overlooked  by  the  common  eye. 

He  loves  to  discover  the  good  in  others,  in  artists,  espe 
cially  beginners,  in  all  pictures,  and  indeed  in  everything.  He 
is  a  practical  optimist,  in  the  best  meaning  of  the  term.  With 
maturity  of  judgment  and  character,  he  has  the  vivacity  of 
youthful  feeling  and  the  freshness  of  the  morning  of  life.  A 
guileless,  generous  gentlemen,  indifferent  to  the  pecuniary 
rewards  of  his  art,  except  so  far  as  they  insure  the  essential 
comforts  of  life  and  brinir  the  independence  he  cherishes  with 
manly  spirit. 

In  common  with  all  the  members  of  his  family,  who  inherit 
a  turn  for  humor  and  vivacity  of  spirit,  he  is  a  lover  of  and 
skilled  in  music,  plays  with  spirit  on  the  violin,  and  is  fond  of 
all  social  and  innocent  pleasures. 

His  figure  is  tall  and  slight,  but  graceful  ;  his  gait  buoyant 
and  springy ;  his  manners  cordial,  and  full  of  bonhommie  ;  with 
a  voice  uncommonly  musical  and  insinuating.  Those  who 
have  not  met  him,  may  obtain  a  good  idea  of  his  physiogno 
my  and  expression,  from  the  admirable  head  by  Elliott,  paint 
ed  for  Goupil  <fe  Co.'s  gallery — a  trifle  too  highly  colored 
perhaps,  and  making  him  look  more  like  a  bandit  than  the 
painter,  still  a  picturesque  head  of  an  artist,  by  one  who  well 
deserves  that  title.  His  smile  and  frank  expression,  both 
very  attractive,  give  way  in  the  portrait  to  a  more  elevated  ex 
pression,  not  the  habitual  look.  His  eye  is  remarkably  mild 
and  intelligent ;  the  whole  profile,  in  a  word,  is  such  as  one 
fancies  a  painter's  face  should  be. 

In  conversation,  he  is  modest  and  unassuming  ;  his  remarks 
are  direct,  full  of  sense,  humor  and  feeling.  He  speaks  hur 
riedly  at  times,  and  without  any  pedantic  precision  ;  but  his 
expressions  are  generally  as  pithy  as  his  ideas  are  just  and 
true. 


RETURN  TO  the  circulation  desk  of  any 
University  of  California  Library 


YB  ?9756 
U.C.  BERKELEY  LIBRARIES 


0003022637 


